On February 10th, the three major US stock indexes closed with mixed gains and losses, with the Nasdaq up nearly 200 points and a cumulative increase of 2.31% this week, reaching a new high since November 2021; The S&P 500 index rose 0.57%, with a cumulative increase of 1.37% this week, breaking the 5000 point mark and reaching a historic high; The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 0.14%, with a cumulative increase of 0.04% this week.
The three major indices have all hit weekly highs for 5 consecutive days. Most large technology stocks rose, with Nvidia rising more than 3%, Tesla, Amazon, and Google rising more than 2%, Microsoft and Intel rising more than 1%, and Apple and Netflix slightly rising; Meta saw a slight decline.
It is worth noting that as of the close, Microsoft's market value exceeded $3.1 trillion, breaking the record set by Apple last year and becoming a new historical high for the market value of American companies.
It is reported that on June 30, 2023, Apple's market value reached $3.05 trillion, becoming the world's first company to exceed $3 trillion in market value.
Popular Chinese concept stocks rose generally, with NetEase Youdao up more than 10%, Qudian up 5%, TAL and Baidu up more than 2%, Tencent Music, Alibaba, NIO, Bilibili and others up more than 1%, while Xiaopeng, Manbang, Ideal Auto and others rose slightly; TSMC, Shell, and others saw a slight decline.
On a macro level, the US Bureau of Labor Statistics has released an annual revision of the Consumer Price Index. In December of last year, the US CPI was revised to a month on month increase of 0.2%, compared to a previous increase of 0.3%; The core CPI remains unchanged at a 0.3% increase.
In other market scenarios, gold futures for April delivery on the New York Mercantile Exchange closed down 0.45% at $2038.70 per ounce. The silver futures for March delivery closed 0.19% lower at $22.594 per ounce.
According to Xinhua News Agency, the Chairman of the Federal Reserve, Jerome Powell, stated on the CBS program "60 Minutes" on February 4th that the Federal Open Market Committee, which sets monetary policy, is unlikely to agree to a rate cut in March.
On the 1st of this month, Powell also stated in an interview with CBS that almost all participants in the Federal Open Market Committee meeting believe that the Fed's interest rate cut this year is appropriate.
The Federal Open Market Committee meets every six weeks, with the next meeting scheduled for March 20th and then May 1st. According to the Financial Times, the Federal Reserve may cut interest rates three times this year instead of the market's expected six times starting from March.
The Federal Reserve concluded its two-day monetary policy meeting on January 31st, announcing that it will maintain the target range of the federal funds rate between 5.25% and 5.5%, and hinted that it will not cut interest rates temporarily.
According to CBS, after Powell became chairman, the Federal Reserve raised interest rates 11 times in two years to combat inflation, causing the federal funds rate to reach a 23 year high. At present, the inflation level in the United States has stabilized for some time, but the Federal Reserve has not yet initiated interest rate cuts based on market expectations.
Powell explained that the Federal Reserve is still anchoring its 2% inflation target and should "carefully address the issue of when to cut interest rates", neither too fast nor too slow. "We need to balance the two risks," but we will not wait until the inflation rate does indeed drop to 2% before lowering interest rates. Moreover, the rate cut may not be high, at 25 or 50 basis points each time. The first interest rate cut is most likely in the middle of this year.