Stocks Reclaimed Friday Losses On Value Buying
5:06 pm Monday, December 06th, 2021
Wall Street equities rose on Monday, led higher by travel stocks, as fears that the Omicron coronavirus variant would lead to fresh lockdowns eased.
The stock market saw some weakness at the open as the Nasdaq quickly surrendered its starting gain, but it bounced just as fast after finding support above Friday’s session low. Concerns about the Omicron variant of the coronavirus are still present, but the weekend went by without reports of the variant leading to serious illness, boosting sentiment.
All eleven sectors trade higher at midday with nine groups up at least 1.0% and five sectors showing gains of 2.0% or more. Lightly weighted utilities (+2.4%) and real estate (+2.1%) lead, suggesting that an element of caution is still present in the market. Meanwhile, financials (+2.0%), industrials (+2.0%), and energy (+2.0%) have also contributed to today’s advance.
All but three components of the financials sector trade in the green with State Street (STT +4.7) leading the way while money center banks like Wells Fargo (WFC) and JPMorgan Chase (JPM) also show solid gains as the yield curve reverses some of last week’s flattening with the 2s10s spread widening by three basis points to 80 bps. The 10-yr yield is currently higher by eight basis points at 1.42%.
The rebound in sentiment has also boosted crude oil, though it remains below Friday’s high (69.22), trading up $2.19, or 3.3%, at $68.45/bbl with its 200-day moving average (69.92) looming above.
The bounce in the price of oil has not stopped airlines from rallying strongly as the likelihood of additional travel restrictions decreases. United Airlines (UAL) and American Airlines (AAL) are both up more than 10.0%, helping the industrials sector (+2.0%) trade near the top of today’s leaderboard.
Also of note, the top-weighted technology sector (+0.6%) is being held back by a weak showing from chipmakers as the PHLX Semiconductor Index falls 1.1% with more than half of its components trading in the red, including NVIDIA (NVDA).
