Stocks were mixed on Friday morning as investors digested a matchup between the two largest US automakers and braced for the next rate hike by the Federal Reserve.
The S&P 500 (^GSPC) rose 0.23%, while the Nasdaq Composite (^IXIC) lost 0.48% and the Dow Jones Industrial Average (^DJI) fell 0.10%.
The S&P 500 ended Thursday’s trading session up more than 20% from its October 2022 low, officially marking the start of a bull market. The stock rally beginning in 2023 comes as strong economic data continue to outweigh lingering recession fears.
“I believe the worst is behind us,” BMO Capital Markets chief investment strategist Brian Belsky, who recently raised his S&P year-end price target to 4,550 from 4,300, told Yahoo Finance Live. “The Fed will probably raise one more interest rate between now and the end of the year, and that’s OK, but I think most of that has already been priced into the market.”
Shares of Tesla ( TSLA ) and General Motors ( GM ) both traded up 5% in the market on Thursday after GM announced it would partner with Tesla to develop the electric vehicle maker’s supercharger network. The announcement comes two weeks after Ford ( F ) announced a similar partnership with Tesla to enable access for Ford vehicles to Tesla’s charging network.
“This collaboration is an important part of our strategy and an important next step in rapidly expanding access to fast chargers for our customers,” GM CEO Mary Barra said in a press release.
Shares of Docusign ( DOCU ) rose more than 6% as the company beat analyst estimates for both earnings and revenue per share in the latest quarter.
Meanwhile, Netflix ( NFLX ) stock rose more than 3% in early Friday trading New data U.S. signups for the streaming service have risen in at least four-and-a-half years since the streamer’s password-sharing crackdown began last month, analytics platform Antenna showed.
On the economic front, Friday is expected to be quiet. Markets predicting the central bank’s next move are currently pricing in a 78% chance that the Federal Reserve will pause its interest rate hike cycle at its meeting next week.
“The FOMC is likely to pause at its June meeting next week, allowing the fog to clear before considering another rate hike,” a team of Goldman Sachs economists led by John Hatzius wrote in a note to clients Thursday night.
Economists added: “The Fed’s leadership views the pause as a prudent course, as uncertainty about the lagged effects of rate hikes it has already delivered and the impact of tight bank lending increases the risk of being inadvertently overstated.”
Josh is a Yahoo Finance reporter.
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