Market Update & Important Indicators:
Tech shares dragged down U.S. stocks Thursday, while global markets largely shook off inaction by the European Central Bank. The stock market has been calm this summer — the S&P 500 hasn't had a daily move of more than 1% in two months. With earnings season wrapping up, investors are focusing on economic data and comments from central bankers. Energy companies jumped as U.S. crude oil rose 4.7% to $47.62 a barrel. U.S. crude oil stockpiles fell sharply last week, according to the Energy Information Administration.
European stocks closed lower Thursday, weighed down by a slide in German equities and a rising euro, after the European Central Bank held off from expanding its monetary stimulus. The Stoxx Europe 600 ended was down 0.3% at 349.32, its lowest close in a week. But recovery in bank stocks and gains for energy shares as oil prices surged helped the benchmark pare an intraday loss of 1.2%. The pan-European benchmark hit session lows in afternoon trade, with German stocks hit as the euro advanced against the U.S. dollar. The moves came as ECB President Mario Draghi spoke after the bank's monetary policy meeting in Frankfurt. He said while there are still risks to the Eurozone economy, the current outlook for the bloc does not warrant a decision for the central bank to act now. Draghi also said they would maintain asset purchases of EUR80 billion ($90 billion) a month until the end of March 2017, or beyond if necessary.
share performance across Asia was mixed. The Nikkei Stock Average fell 0.3% as the yen continued to strengthen against the U.S. dollar, while a speech by a senior Bank of Japan official failed to clear uncertainty over the central bank's future policy direction. All eyes will now be on the BOJ's next meeting on Sept. 20-21. Bank of Japan Deputy Gov. Hiroshi Nakaso on Thursday said it wasn't right to take negative rate reductions off the table, just because of their potential harm to bank profits, suggesting his openness to further rate cuts. But analysts were sceptical. Putting rates further into negative territory is difficult to implement amid a lack of public support, said Katsunori Kitakura, strategist at Sumitomo Mitsui Trust Bank. Elsewhere in region, the South Korean Kospi added 0.1%, and Singapore's Straits Times Index was off 0.4%.
Broad selling weighed on Australian shares Thursday, as investors shrugged off positive economic data and gains by oil and other commodities. The tone for the session was set by overnight weakness on Wall Street, as well as caution ahead of the European Central Bank's monetary policy decision and comments from President Mario Draghi later in the global day. While off early lows, the S&P/ASX 200 still lost 38.4 points, or 0.7%, to finish at 5385.8. On the heels of strong economic growth figures Wednesday, data released Thursday showed a greater-than-expected narrowing of Australia's trade deficit in July on the month before.
Copper prices declined after Chinese data showed a slowdown of copper imports into the world's largest consumer of the industrial metal. Other base metals were mixed on Thursday. Aluminium closed up 0.2% at $1,576/t, zinc closed down 0.1% to $2,316/t, tin closed down 0.3% to $19,635/t, nickel closed up 1.0% to $10,162/t, and lead closed down 1.4% to $1,909/t.
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