Dow, S&P 500, Nasdaq open muted as rocky month draws to an end, CME restores trading

S&P 500 company earnings in the third quarter have largely been solid. And with nearly all of the reports in, the 13.4% earnings growth rate so far is likely to hold.

Although most (83%) of the earnings surprises have been to the upside, investors have been less enthusiastic about earnings beats and more punishing about earnings disappointments, as indicated by the reactions in individual stock names.

According to FactSet’s John Butters, as of Nov. 21, S&P 500 companies that have reported third quarter earnings beats have seen their stock price increase by an average of 0.4% in the four-day period around their earnings release. This is less than the five-year average increase of 0.9%.

For companies that miss earnings estimates, the reaction has been disproportionately negative.

Companies that report earnings below expectations have seen their stock decrease by 5% on average during the same period (two days before the earnings release through two days after). This is well below the five-year average decrease of 2.6%.

Concerns about an artificial intelligence bubble, slowing consumer spending, and Federal Reserve rate cuts were in flux throughout the season. And sky-high expectations created a high bar for some individual names, such as Nvidia (NVDA).

Read out live coverage of corporate earnings.

Yahoo Finance’s Emma Ockerman reports:

Plenty of Americans are expected to pour into stores and fill online carts this holiday shopping season. Fewer may be able to pick up seasonal work to support that bonanza.

As layoff announcements make waves and the unemployment rate creeps up, the usual holiday hiring spree appears muted this year, with data from multiple sources suggesting that hiring plans may be at their lowest levels in over a decade.

Challenger, Gray & Christmas said in its most recent labor report that seasonal hiring plans through October were at their lowest since the global outplacement firm began tracking them in 2012.

The National Retail Federation, a trade group, also said in a press call earlier this month that while strong consumer spending was expected to persist through the holiday season, plans to bring on extra staff could be at “the lowest level in more than 15 years.” Retailers were expected to bring on 265,000 to 365,000 seasonal workers, compared to 442,000 in 2024.

Interest in seasonal work, though, remains plenty high — up 27% at the end of September compared to a year earlier — as Americans struggle to find employment across the board, according to Cory Stahle, a senior economist at the Indeed Hiring Lab.

… “I think it’s very telling that we’re still well below where we were in those seasonal jobs a couple of years ago,” Stahle said. “There are clearly just a lot fewer opportunities overall.”

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The CME Group said all its markets were back up and trading after a data center cooling problem led to a widespread outage that lasted several hours.

Futures on the Dow Jones Industrial Average (YM=F), S&P 500 (ES=F), and Nasdaq 100 (NQ=F) were steady when trading resumed. Dow and S&P 500 futures rose 0.1%, while Nasdaq futures gained 0.3%.

WTI crude oil futures (CL=F) gained 0.3%; Brent futures (BZ=F) edged up by 0.1%.

CME reopened its foreign-exchange platform EBS at around 7 a.m. ET, but trading for the rest of its markets, including US Treasurys and crude futures, was affected until roughly 8:30 a.m. ET. CME attributed the outage to a cooling system glitch at a data center near Chicago.

Yahoo Finance’s Allie Canal writes:

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The CME (CME) has started to gradually restore operations early Friday after halting trading of futures and options for several hours, thanks to a technical glitch.

Foreign-exchange platform EBS opened for trading at around 7 a.m. ET, according to a notice on the CME website. There was no indication of when other markets stalled by the outage could expect a restart.

“BrokerTec US Actives and BrokerTec EU are now open. Due to a cooling issue at CyrusOne data centers, our other markets are currently halted,” the notice said.

Markets in the US and across the world were impacted by the CME futures shutdown, with US Treasurys and WTI crude futures among those impacted as bond and commodities platforms went dark.

A cooling issue at CyrusOne data centers was the root of the stoppage, according to CME.

Bloomberg reports:

Gold (GC=F) edged higher, on track for a fourth monthly gain, on heightened expectations for another interest-rate cut in the US.

The trading of futures and options on the Chicago Mercantile Exchange stopped for several hours due to a data center fault, affecting liquidity in precious metals markets and leading to choppy sessions with wider-than-usual bid-ask spreads.

Bullion was near $4,160 an ounce on Friday, up more than 2% for the week. A series of comments by Federal Reserve officials and the release of delayed economic data have supported the case for lower borrowing costs, which typically benefit gold as it doesn’t pay interest. Swap traders are pricing in a more-than-80% chance of a quarter-point cut in December.

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Bloomberg reports:

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Bloomberg reports:

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