US stock indices recorded slight gain on Wednesday after it became clear that Trump would support raising the debt ceiling. Investors also looked at Hurricanes Irma, which is sweeping across the Caribbean and looks set to hit Florida. The continued tension around North Korea continued to affect the sentiment on Wall Street. A vote on a necessary increase in the US debt ceiling was delayed until December.
The leading Dow-Jones index ended with a 0.3 percent gain on 21,807.64 points. The broad S & P 500 also ended 0.3 percent higher at 2465.54 points. NASDAQ, which is heavily weighted in technology and Internet stocks, also added 0.3 percent to 6393.31 points.
Automakers were in the spotlight. A Fed report revealed that there are signals across the country indicating a slowdown in the sector. In some regions, for instance, there were falling sales and increased inventories. Investors did not seem to be impressed. Automakers like Ford and General Motors grew over 1 percent. Fiat Chrysler saw its market value rise by 5.5 percent, helped by an advisory increase.
Trivago suffered heavy loss of more than 25 percent after the German hotel search platform came with a profit warning as it overspent on marketing activities. For the full year, it now expects revenue growth around 40 percent.
Light crude oil reached a 4-week peak after it was announced that the refineries in Texas and the Gulf of Mexico had returned to full capacity. The price of black gold was also boosted by a statement by Russia’s Energy Minister Alexander Novak, who backed the expansion of the agreement with OPEC if the demand for oil markets is not balanced by April 1, 2018. The potential for price pressure could be the resumed production of the largest oil field in Libya this week.
The level of rhetoric between Pyongyang and Washington heats up again after the United States submitted a bill to the UN requesting an oil embargo over North Korea and freezing Kim Chung-un’s assets, which could seriously harm green money. Trump also said that war on North Korea is not the first choice, but this option is not ruled out.
