US stocks back near record highs

Summary:

• US indices trade firmly higher before cash session

• US500 back near ATH of 3254

• Initial jobless claims 222k vs 222k expected

After positive trade in both the Asian and European sessions, US stock benchmarks are trading close to their highest ever level before their own cash session begins. There had been a little bit of weakness in US indices at the end of 2019 with the US500 pulling back, but as had been the case for most of the year, the dip turned out to be a good buying opportunity. The market gapped higher overnight after being closed yesterday, and price has continued to rise and trade just a few points from its record high ahead of the opening bell.

The US500 ended 2019 at around 3230 and has begun the new year brightly, trading firmly higher ahead of the opening bell. Source: xStation

Tomorrow’s ISM release (3PM GMT) represents the first big data point of 2020 for US stocks, but before then there’s a couple of other events on the economic calendar worth mentioning. The initial jobless claims for the week came in exactly as expected at 222k, showing a slight drop on the prior reading of 224k - this itself was revised up by 2k from the first release. 

This is still low by historical standards but does see the 4-week moving average move higher and there has been some potential signs in the past month that this metric may be starting to creep higher. At 2:45PM there’s the final manufacturing PMI for December, expected unchanged at 52.5 and this may give some insight into the strength of the sector ahead of tomorrow’s more widely followed ISM number.