US stocks were lower across all tickers on Thursday with the factors behind that not altogether logical but traders said it was jitters ahead of Donald Trump’s inauguration as President on Friday.
Even a jump in oil inventories seemed to send oil prices higher albeit briefly, while some buoyant business activity data from the Philly Fed and lower jobless claims, and a boost to Netflix (NASDAQ:NFLX) shares did nothing to repair the bourse.
Financials and biotech stocks – two of the biggest beneficiaries in the Trump inspired rally – have both retreated sharply this week.
Along with lower Dow and Nasdaq stocks, the S&P 500 market bellwether was down 0.1% at 2268 and led by steelmaker Nucor Corp (NYSE:NUE) down 3% to $60.55. Alongside it oil companies were being dumped, with Tesoro Petroleum Corp (NYSE:TSO), nyse:c="" rel="5906">nyse:c="" petroleum="" rel="12608">NYSE:MPC) among the casualties, while other oil stocks like NYSE:C="" oil="" rel="6348">NRG Energy (NYSE:NRG) advanced.
At least oil stocks were responding to the latest EIA oil glut data. In the latest week, US crude oil stocks rose by 2.3mln barrels. That’s down from 4mln a week ago but way above a fall of 342,000 forecast.
Still, the US oil benchmark price, the WTI, advanced to up 1.4% from 1.3% and was only 15 minutes later easing off to be up 0.8% at $51.49.
Meanwhile, US commodities regulators levied a $25mln penalty on Citigroup Global Markets (nyse:c) on Thursday to settle charges of “spoofing” – entering bids or offers with the intent of cancelling them before execution – in the US Treasury futures market.
The US Commodity Futures Trading Commission said the spoofing took place between 2011 and 2012 and involved more than 2,500 orders placed by five traders at Citigroup.
Citi shares were down 0.7% at $56.98 on Thursday.
The S&P Midcap 400 was down 0.6% at 1669 and led by Aaron's Inc (NYSE:AAN) down 6.5% to $3019 and the S&P Smallcap 600 was down 0.9% to 825 and led by Rent-A-Center Inc (NASDAQ:RCII) down 14.1% at $8.75 after the company issued dismal preliminary guidance for fourth-quarter 2016.
The company now anticipates fourth-quarter Core US same-store sales (comps) to decline nearly 14%, while expects Acceptance Now comps to edge up in the range of 1–2%.
Further, Rent-A-Center now expects to report a fourth-quarter loss of 20–30 cents per share, on both adjusted and GAAP basis.
Pre-Open
US stocks are heading for a flat opening on Thursday despite bullish weekly jobless claims data which recorded its lowest in 43 years and a surprise jump in the Philly Fed’s manufacturing gauge.
The S&P 500 market bellwether is seen dipping by 0.04%, the Nasdaq Composite flat and the Dow Jones Industrial Average down 0.05%.
But one stand-out stock is Netflix (NASDAQ:NFLX). Up as much as 8% earlier, the shares were last trading up 6.8% to $142.34 pre-market as investors lapped up news that the online video streamer reported a massive surge in subscriber growth overnight.
The company added 7mln members globally in the final quarter of 2016, handily beating its earlier forecast for 5.2mln new subscribers, taking its tally to 93.8mln members.
In data, a mixed bag. While building permits were lower than forecast, housing starts were higher. Bullish data came from lower-than-expected weekly initial jobless claims which hit a 43-year low of 234,000, and a surge in the Philadelphia Fed manufacturing index. In January it posted 23.6. That’s above December’s 21.5 and a reversal of expectations of a fall to 15.8.
EIA oil inventories data starts to roll out from 1030 ET (1530 GMT).