US Stocks Open Higher; Retail Sales Rise In May

U.S. stocks traded higher this morning, with Dow Jones gaining around 180 points on Thursday.

Following the market opening Thursday, the Dow traded up 0.53% to 34,159.59 while the NASDAQ rose 0.18% to 13,651.09. The S&P 500, also rose, gaining, 0.35% to 4,387.88.

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Leading and Lagging Sectors

• Energy shares jumped by 1.4% on Thursday. Meanwhile, top gainers in the sector included Patterson-UTI Energy, Inc. PTEN, up 8%, and Earthstone Energy, Inc. ESTE, up 5%.
• In trading on Thursday, real estate shares fell by 0.2%.

Top Headline

Retail sales in the U.S. increased 0.3% month-over-month in May versus a 0.4% growth in April, and topping market expectations for a 0.1% drop.

Equities Trading UP

• EdtechX Holdings Acquisition Corp. II EDTX shares shot up 142% to $26.80. EdtechX Holdings Acquisition Corp II reported an amendment to extend date to consummate a business combination from June 15, 2023 to Dec. 15, 2023.
• Shares of Leju Holdings Limited LEJU got a boost, shooting 32% to $3.85 after gaining 15% on Wednesday.
• MicroVision, Inc. MVIS shares were also up, gaining 13% to $5.21 after the company withdrew its proposed public offering of common stock.

Equities Trading DOWN

• Mersana Therapeutics, Inc. MRSN shares dropped 58% to $4.0450 after the FDA issued a partial clinical hold pausing new patient enrollment in the company's UP-NEXT and UPGRADE-A ovarian cancer trials.
• Shares of Bone Biologics Corporation BBLG were down 53% to $1.8650 after the company priced its public offering of 2.54 million shares at $1.97 per share.
• Top KingWin Ltd TCJH was down, falling 24% to $7.09.

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Commodities

In commodity news, oil traded up 0.9% to $68.90 while gold traded down 1.5% at $1,940.10.

Silver traded down 3.1% to $23.355 on Thursday while copper fell 0.2% to $3.8620.

Euro zone

European shares were mixed today. The eurozone’s STOXX 600 fell 0.4%, London’s FTSE 100 rose 0.1% while Spain’s IBEX 35 Index gained 0.1% The German DAX dropped 0.7% French CAC 40 fell 0.8% and Italy’s FTSE MIB Index fell 0.5%.

The European Central Bank increased interest rates by 25 basis points during its June meeting. The Eurozone recorded a deficit of EUR 11.7 billion in April versus a year-ago gap of EUR 34.5 billion.

Spanish trade deficit shrank to EUR 4.38 billion in April from EUR 6.39 billion in the year-ago month. French consumer price inflation was confirmed at 5.1% year-over-year in May, recording the lowest level since April 2022.

Asia Pacific Markets

Asian markets closed mixed on Thursday, with Japan’s Nikkei 225 dropping 0.05%, Hong Kong’s Hang Seng Index gaining 2.17% and China’s Shanghai Composite Index gaining 0.74%. India’s S&P BSE Sensex fell 0.5%.

India's merchandise trade deficit shrank to $22.12 billion in May from $24.29 billion in the year-ago month. Manufacturing production in Hong Kong surged 3.9% year-over-year in the first quarter versus a 0.1% drop in the prior period. Japan's trade deficit narrowed to JPY 1,372.5 billion in May from JPY 2,366.1 billion in the year-ago month.

Chinese retail sales climbed by 12.7% year-over-year in May, while unemployment rate came in unchanged at 5.2% in May. China's industrial production surged by 3.5% year-over-year in May. The People’s Bank of China cut the one-year medium-term lending facility rate by 10 basis points to 2.65%, while Hong Kong Monetary Authority held its base rate unchanged at 5.5%.

Economics

• The NY Empire State Manufacturing Index jumped 38 points to a reading of +6.6 in June.
• U.S. jobless claims came in unchanged at 262,000 in the week ending June 10, versus the previous week’s revised value. However, analysts were expecting a reading of 249,000.
• Retail sales in the U.S. increased 0.3% month-over-month in May versus a 0.4% growth in April, and topping market expectations for a 0.1% drop.
• Export prices in the U.S. fell 1.9% month-over-month in May, while import prices fell 0.6% during the month.
• Industrial production in the U.S. declined 0.2% from a month ago in May, missing market estimates of a 0.1% growth.
• U.S. business inventories increased by 0.2% from a month ago in April.

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COVID-19 Update

The U.S. has the highest number of coronavirus cases and deaths in the world, reporting a total of 107,198,300 cases with around 1,166,860 deaths. India confirmed a total of at least 44,993,180 cases and 531,890 deaths, while France reported over 40,118,610 COVID-19 cases with 167,500 deaths. In total, there were at least 690,356,740 cases of COVID-19 worldwide with more than 6,891,280 deaths.