A late slide pulled major indexes into the red on Thursday, leaving the S&P 500 and the Dow Jones Industrial Average slightly below the record highs they set a day earlier. The S&P fell 14 points to 4,778, the Dow fell 90 points to 36,398, and the Nasdaq fell 24 points to 15,741. Trading was relatively quiet with many investors having closed out their positions for the year, per the AP. Of note Thursday: Cruise lines fell after the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recommended that passengers avoid cruise travel, regardless of their COVID-19 vaccination status. Crude oil prices rose slightly. The yield on the 10-year Treasury fell to 1.51%.
Most of Wall Street is on vacation or has closed their positions for 2021, which means trading is extremely light. Investors will likely not make any large moves until next week with the start of the New Year. Still, investors got a couple bits of good news to close out the year. The number of Americans applying for unemployment benefits fell below 200,000, more evidence that the job market remains strong in the aftermath of last year’s coronavirus recession. Wall Street will get the December jobs report next week. Meanwhile the Chicago Purchasing Manager Index, a gauge of manufacturing and economic activity, came in at 63.1 for December. That's slightly better than the reading of 62.0 that economists were expecting, according to FactSet.
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