Stock Market Today: Dow ends 260 points lower while bond yields slide ahead of too-close-to-call election - MarketWatch

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Nov. 4, 2024 at 4:22 PM EST

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Updated 5 hours ago

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Frances Yue

U.S. stocks ended lower on Monday, as investors await the too-close-to-call presidential election on Tuesday.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average went down 257.59 points or 0.6% to end at 41794.60, according to Dow Jones Market Data.

The S&P 500 fell 16.11 points or 0.3% to close at 5712.69.

The Nasdaq Composite lost 59.93 points or 0.3% to finish at 18179.98.

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5 hours ago

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Vivien Lou Chen

Monday's rally in U.S. government debt, triggered by a Des Moines Register poll that tilted in favor of Vice President Kamala Harris in tomorrow's election, sent the rate on the longest-dated government maturity down by the most in two months.

The 30-year yield fell 6.4 basis points to 4.495%. That was the biggest one-day decline since Sept. 3, based on 3 p.m. Eastern time figures from Dow Jones Market Data.

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6 hours ago

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Myra P. Saefong

Crude prices settled higher on Monday after a decision by OPEC+ to extend voluntary production cuts by another month.

This week, OPEC+ may have hit the pause button, but the “market roller coaster is just getting started,” Stephen Innes, managing partner at SPI Asset Management, told MarketWatch. “By postponing the production hike, they’re effectively buying two crucial months — time for China’s stimulus, particularly initiatives from the National People’s Congress starting on Nov. 4, to seep into its energy markets.”

On the New York Mercantile Exchange, December West Texas Intermediate crude rose $1.98, or nearly 2.9%, to settle at $71.47 a barrel. January Brent crude added $1.98, or 2.7%, to $75.08 on ICE Futures Europe.

Natural-gas futures, meanwhile, also climbed, with the December contract ending at $2.78 per million British thermal units, up 12 cents, or 4.4%, as traders kept an eye on a developing weather system that’s expected to enter the Gulf of Mexico and become a hurricane later this week, potentially threatening energy infrastructure in the region.

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6 hours ago

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Christine Idzelis

An exchange-traded fund that holds the Big Tech stocks collectively known as the Magnificent Seven was down Monday afternoon, with Tesla Inc. falling the most among the group.

Shares of the Roundhill Magnificent Seven ETF — which holds Tesla, Facebook parent Meta Platforms Inc., Amazon.com Inc., Google parent Alphabet Inc., Microsoft Corp., Apple Inc. and Nvidia Corp. —were falling 0.5% in afternoon trading, according to FactSet data, at last check.

Tesla’s stock was slumping 1.8%, making it the worst-performing stock in the ETF’s portfolio in Monday’s trading session, according to FactSet data. Nvidia was the sole stock held by the fund that was in positive territory, with a gain of 1.8%, FactSet data showed Monday afternoon.

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7 hours ago

By

Isabel Wang

Wall Street on Monday was bracing for a week of volatile trading before one of the most closely fought U.S. presidential elections in history. Investors have increasingly worried that the results of the 2024 election may take time to emerge, but one strategist at Wells Fargo Investment Institute said delays in vote counting should have little equity impact this time.

"Financial-market volatility can accompany delays after Election Day but tends to fade as the economy typically quickly reasserts its role as the main driver of expected earnings," Douglas Beath, global investment strategist at Wells Fargo Investment Institute, said in a Monday client note.

A delayed election outcome is certainly possible this year, as the "dead heat" in the polls may show "a truly tight race" on Election Day, while some combination of swing states complete a slow vote count that takes days or longer, Beath wrote.

However, Beath and his team do not see delayed results having "a lasting, negative effect" on stock prices beyond a short bout of volatility. He said the Federal Reserve's November policy meeting later this week should help "refocus" investors on what matters most for markets: the near-term path of interest rates and the economic trajectory into 2025.

7 hours ago

By

Frances Yue

Small-cap stocks were outperforming their large-cap peers on Monday, ahead of Tuesday's U.S. election and the Federal Reserve's November policy meeting on Wednesday and Thursday.

The Russell 2000, made up of the 2,000 smallest stocks by market capitalization in the Russell 3000 Index, was rising 0.8% to roughly 2,226 and outperforming the S&P 500, which was falling 0.1%, according to FactSet data.

“Small-cap stocks are getting a lift from lower Treasury yields and as Trump’s odds of winning the election on betting markets improved a bit from the weekend,” said José Torres, senior economist at Interactive Brokers.

Small-cap companies are more sensitive to interest rates, as they tend to have weaker balance sheets, a higher percentage of debt and less fixed-rate debt when compared with their large-cap peers.

Meanwhile, a Donald Trump presidency is seen as particularly bullish for small-cap companies, which tend to have most, if not all of their operations in the U.S., and would likely benefit the most if Trump implements corporate tax cuts and scales back regulations on certain sectors.

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7 hours ago

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Frances Yue

Bitcoin was falling 1.4% on Monday to around $67,883 and on track for its sixth straight daily decline, as crypto traders await the U.S. presidential election on Tuesday.

The largest crypto rose above $73,000 last Tuesday, near its all-time high of $73,798 reached in March, according to FactSet data. However, it has been falling since then as the odds of a Trump victory have decreased on key betting markets.

Bitcoin is up 60.9% so far this year, while it is 8% away from its March all-time high.

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7 hours ago

By

Christine Idzelis

Shares of exchange-traded funds that buy bonds were rising Monday afternoon, as Treasury yields retreated and the U.S. stock market traded mixed.

The iShares Core U.S. Aggregate Bond ETF and Vanguard Total Bond Market ETF were each up 0.3% in afternoon trading, according to FactSet data, at last check. The ETFs were gaining as yields in the Treasury bond market traded down, with the rate on the 10-year Treasury note falling about 6 basis points to around 4.31%, according to FactSet data, at last check.

In the U.S. equities market, the Dow Jones Industrial Average was down 0.5% while the S&P 500 traded about flat and the Nasdaq Composite edged up 0.1%, FactSet data show, at last check.

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8 hours ago

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Joseph Adinolfi

Wall Street is still on edge ahead of Tuesday’s U.S. election. But some traders appear to be getting a head start on bets that a relief rally will take hold once the vote tallies are known.

To wit, trading in put options tied to the Cboe Volatility Index, known as Wall Street’s “fear gauge,” soared on Friday relative to trading in call options. By the time the market closed, activity in puts had surpassed that in calls by the widest margin in four years, FactSet data showed.

That means a number of traders are betting that the VIX will fall during the weeks ahead, although open interest in VIX calls is still greater than open interest for puts.

Wall Street is still on edge ahead of Tuesday’s U.S. election. But some traders appear to be getting a head start on bets that a relief rally will take hold once the vote tallies are known.

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8 hours ago

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Myra P. Saefong

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Natural-gas prices were up by more than 4% in Monday trading, buoyed by an intensifying weather system, currently referred to Tropical Depression 18, that may be headed into the Gulf of Mexico, putting oil-and-gas infrastructure at risk.

The depression is expected to become a tropical storm late Monday and a hurricane by Wednesday, according to the U.S. National Hurricane Center.

At this point "we do not know the intensity of the storm but the track looks like it is right over offshore infrastructure," Phil Flynn, senior market analyst at the Price Futures Group, told MarketWatch. Natural-gas prices had been weak due to warm weather, but have "flipped to the upside as the storm track looks more likely to shut in some Gulf natural-gas and oil production. The key will be the intensity and the market will have to watch this very closely."

Natural gas for December delivery added 11.7 cents, or 4.4%, to $2.78 per million British thermal units on the New York Mercantile Exchange. December West Texas Intermediate oil, the U.S. benchmark, was also up $2.04, or 2.9%, at $71.53 a barrel — supported in part by the OPEC+ decision to delay its production-hike plan by a month.

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