The Stock Market At Close – Wednesday, August 23
The Toronto Market
The Toronto TSX composite index gained 188.58 points, or 0.96%, to close the market session today at 19,879.79. What a difference a day makes! Yesterday, TSX was at a two month low but sprung up at today’s market with vigor.
The Toronto TSX composite index gained 188.58 points, or 0.96%, to close the market session today at 19,879.79. What a difference a day makes? Yesterday, TSX was at a two month low but sprung up at today market with vigor.
Nine of the ten major sectors gained today. Energy was the only sector to close in the red. Technology led the gainers with a 3.12% gain. Basic Materials followed with a gain of 1.65%. Financials gained 1.02%
The 10-year yield dropped 16.8 basis points to round up at 3.64%. Speculators have their eyes and mind tuned in to hear what Fed Chief Jerome will have to say about interest rate hike. Ordinary folks on Main Street have been feeling the bit of the inflation fighting efforts of the Feds for some time. Federal Executives must rely on concrete formal data and generally it takes time for the policy effects to reflect on formal or regulatory data platforms.
Mining and Technology shares dominated the market performance today. The market’s mood today was like a rising tide that lifts all boats.
Today’s Statistics: Today, the gaining issues (advancers) outnumbered the declined issues (decliners). The ratio of advancers to decliners was 4.08-to-1.00. In real numbers, 1,115 advancers to 273 decliners with 178 unchanged. There were 17 new 52-week highs and 23 new 52-week lows. The total volume of shares traded for gaining stocks was 69,138,533 or 28.5%; the total volume for declined stocks was 165,334,688 or 68.1% and 8,140,260 or 3.4% for “Unchanged”.
The total volume of stocks traded today was 267,318,618 compared to 242,613,481 yesterday.
The bears spent the day napping today so the bulls were definitely in control, powered by Technology and Mining stocks.
The US Market
The Dow Jones index gained 184.15 points, or 0.54%, to close at 34,472.98. The S&P 500 gained 48.46 points, or 1.10%, to close at 4,436.01. The Nasdaq Composite added 215.16 points, or 1.59%, to close at 13,721.03.
Nine of the major sectors ended today’s session with gains. Technology led with 1.91% gain and Financials with 1.18% gain. Industrials followed with 1.14%. Basic Materials gained 0.97%.
Key economic data out Wednesday morning includes the S&P Global’s Purchasing Managers’ Index, or PMI, for the manufacturing and services indexes. The manufacturing index dipped to 47.0 in August, below the 48.8 estimate and down from July’s 49.0 reading. Further, the services index dropped to 51.0 in August vs. 52.3 in July.
Today’s Statistics: Today, the gaining issues (advancers) totally outnumbered the declined issues (decliners) on both the NYSE and NASDAQ. The ratio of decliners to advancers on the NYSE was 3.73-to-1. In real numbers, 3,138 advancers to 840 decliners with 242 unchanged. There were 65 new 52-week highs and 87 new 52-week lows. The total volume of volume-gaining stocks was 585,058,615 or 64.7%; the total volume of declined-volume stocks was 312,574,516 or 34.6%; and 6,750,835 or 0.7% “Unchanged”.
The total volume of stocks traded on the NYSE today was 904,383,966 compared to 794,775,812 yesterday. Volume certainly returned to the market today. Investors who had been on the sidelines jumped in today. The volume today on the NYSE was way above daily average.
On the NASDAQ, the ratio of advancers to decliners was 2.06-to-1 and difference was less pronounced than on the NYSE. In real numbers, 2,944 decliners to 1,423 advancers with 354 unchanged. There were 63 new 52-week highs and 169 new 52-week lows. The total volume of volume-gaining stocks was 2,917,328,631 or 67.6%; the total volume of declined-volume stocks was 1,310,391,618 or 30.4% and 89,140,641 or 2.1% for “Unchanged”.
The total volume of stocks traded was 4,316,860,890 compared to 4,379,429,588 yesterday.
Today, the volume on the NASDAQ was down compared to recent average. Today volume was 1.4% less than the volume yesterday.
Oil and the money markets: US oil prices slid 1.5% in the morning today. WTI futures held just below $77.98 a barrel as at the time of this writing.
10 –year Treasury Yield: the 10-year U.S. Treasury yield ticked lower to 4.24%, after settling at 4.32% yesterday. The yield has not been that high since 2007.
Stocks In The News/Stocks To Watch
The Toronto Market
Shopify was a star today. The stock gained 4.96% or $3.63 to close at $76.83 with a total of 3.1M shares changing hands today.
Shopify (SHOP) has integrated the Solana Pay app as a new payment option for businesses and consumers, Solana Labs said Wednesday. “With no intermediary, Solana Pay eliminates bank fees, chargebacks, and holding times while enabling immediate, direct payment settlement of USD stablecoins compatible with Solana,” the company said.
Meanwhile according to MT Newswires yesterday, leaked email showed that Shopify’s (SHOP) plans to remove a key benefit for about 16,000 of its highest-paying subscribers, Business Insider reported Tuesday, citing a leaked internal email.
Subscriptions for Shopify Plus, a platform for bigger brands, start at $2,000 a month and include exclusive benefits such as tax services, business-to-business and wholesale tools and merchant success managers, according to the report.
The e-commerce company plans to remove the access to merchant success managers of Plus merchants with annual sales of less than $2 million, while Plus merchants with annual gross merchandise value of $2 million to $10 million will no longer have an assigned merchant success manager, Business Insider reported, citing the email.
Boralex Inc. (TSX:BLX) is a good watch to keep an eye on. The stock currently rates high when compared to other stocks. BLX stock gained $0.74, or 2.16% to close at $34.18 with 253.0K shares traded today.
The US Market
In after-hours trading on the stock market today, NVDA stock surged 8% to 508.67. During the regular session today, NVDA stock gained $14.48 or 3.17% to close at 471.16 with 77.9M shares traded. Earnings report details will be posted along with tomorrow’s market report.
Year to date through Wednesday’s close, NVDA stock has risen 222% thanks to a steady stream of AI news. Nvidia Corp. has emerged as a leader in semiconductors, software and services for artificial intelligence applications, including generative AI.
C3.ai (AI) is one of those not often talked about AI company. It is certainly a stock to add to the watchlist in case the rally resumes. Right now, the market is in a downtrend.
Regular Market Day Features
The Beginner Investor’s (Canadian stocks) Watchlist
The Canadian Vanguard Chinese Stocks Watchlist
EV, Energy and Resource Stocks Watchlist
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