Day Traders Diary

10/15/24

The major averages took a breather from the recent rally that lifted the averages to new record highs, as traders sift through the latest corporate earnings reports.The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 324 points or 0.75% as UnitedHealth Group, Caterpillar and Chevron weighed on the average. The S&P 500 fell 44 points or 0.75% while the Nasdaq Composite fell 187 points or 1%.

Plenty of earnings today. As mentioned, UnitedHealth was down 6% on disappointing earnings, weighing down the Dow. The HMOs were all lower. The banks today helped the Dow and S&P 500. Bank of America and Goldman Sachs were higher on earnings. PNC was higher by 3% on earnings.

So far, about 40 S&P 500 companies have reported third-quarter results. Of those, 80% have beaten analyst expectations, per FactSet.

Tech stocks were having a good day until ASML preannounced earnings. The stock fell 16% dragging the chip sector with it. Nvidia and AMD were down 4%, Broadcom and Micron were down 3%.

Another weak sector today was the energy space as the price of oil fell 4% as experts do not expect Isreal to retaliate again oil fields in Iran, but instead focus on military targets.

Wall Street is coming off a winning session that propelled the S&P 500 and Dow to all-time highs. Notably, the Dow added more than 200 points to finish above the 43,000 mark for the first time.