US stock indexes recorded gains on Friday thanks to better-than-expected employment data in the country. The blue-chip Dow Jones industrial average rose 93 points with shares of McDonald’s contributing most to the growth. The index, which tracks shares of 30 companies, briefly added more than 100 points.
The broader index S&P 500 rose 0.6 percent led mainly due to rise in the technology sector, which grew 1.45 percent in the wake of above 1.6 percent in market cap heavyweights Apple, Microsoft and Facebook. Despite losing about 3 percent last week, the tech sector jumped 17 percent so far this year and tops among the 11 major S&P groups. The tech-heavy Nasdaq composite was clearly the strongest, having increased by 1 percent.
In June, the US economy added 222 thousand jobs and, according to a government report Friday. Economists were looking for 179 thousand new positions. However, unemployment rate increased to 4.4% from 4.3%. However, wage growth, which is seen as a measure of inflation, was only 0.2 percent.
“The June jobs data signalled more cyclical strength behind the US economic expansion but also less structural tightness in labour markets, which allows the Federal Reserve to proceed gradually on the path to policy normalisation,” said Lena Komileva at G+ Economics.
“For markets that have gone into overdrive over policy tightening fears in the past two weeks, this should help to quell the rates panic.”
“It was a hot day,” said JJ Kinahan, chief market strategist at TD Ameritrade. “The reaction of the capital market, however, is tempered by data on wage growth” immediately after its publication, he says.
Investors monitor wage growth and the expectations are Fed will raise rates again this year.
“To have wage growth, it has to come from somewhere. Or employees should increase their value to employers or should be reduced profit margins,” said Jason Thomas, chief economist at AssetMark.
Yields on US government securities remained high after the publication of the data of the labor ministry. Yields on 10-year bonds is about 2.39%, and 2-year yield, which is more sensitive to changes in monetary policy, is about 1.40%.The value of the US dollar against a basket of currencies fluctuated between increases and decreases.
