US: Stocks shrug off inflation data, end flat
WALL Street stocks were little changed on Thursday as investors largely shrugged off disappointing inflation data.
The Department of Labor’s consumer price index, a key measure of inflation, was up 3.4 per cent from a year ago and up slightly from November.
The data had been keenly anticipated for its implications on potential Federal Reserve interest rate cuts.
But after a meandering session, the Dow Jones Industrial Average finished up less than 0.1 per cent at 37,711.02.
The broad-based S&P 500 fell 0.1 per cent to 4,780.24, while the tech-rich Nasdaq Composite Index was unchanged at 14,970.19.
“The CPI was not a good number... but (it) wasn’t bad enough to give us a real reason for a sell-off either,” said Steve Sosnick of Interactive Brokers.
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“And that’s why we were sort of muddling around at slightly lower levels.”
Among individual companies, Citigroup fell 1.8 per cent after disclosing billions of dollars in fourth-quarter costs. The bank will report earnings on Friday, along with several other large lenders.
Boeing dropped 2.3 per cent as US air safety regulators announced a probe into the company following last week’s emergency landing of an Alaska Airlines plane after a panel blew out mid-air.
Hertz tumbled 4.3 per cent as it announced plans to sell one-third of its electric vehicles due to lackluster demand for the autos in the United States. AFP
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