The first day of the new month, the third quarter and the second half of the year ended on a positive note Friday, heading into a long holiday weekend. The stock market is closed on Monday for July 4th. Perhaps, it’s a welcome breather after Wall Street on Thursday wrapped up a terrible first half of 2022. The S & P 500 posted its worst six-month start to a year since 1970. From January to the end of June, the broad market index lost nearly 21% and fell into bear market territory, defined as a drop of more than 20% from a prior high, which was a record in early January. The three main drivers of that dismal performance were the supply chain woes exacerbated by China’s Covid lockdowns, Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and the highest inflation in 40 years that has forced the Federal Reserve to aggressively raise rates to slow the economy down. For the week, all of the major stock benchmarks were lower— the fourth weekly decline in the last five. On Friday, shares of chipmakers — including Club holdings Qualcomm (QCOM), Nvidia (NVDA), Marvell (MRVL) and Advanced Micro Devices (AMD) — fell after Micron Technology (MU) provided weak guidance in its quarterly earnings release on Thursday after the bell. Micron was down more than 5% during Friday’s trading, before trimming some of those losses by the close. Meanwhile, the U.S. dollar index remains near the 105 level. Gold continues to hover around $1,800 per ounce. Commodities have been volatile, including American oil benchmark West Texas Intermediate crude , which ended the month of June lower for the first time since November. While it closed higher Friday, WTI and many major commodities have been rolling over recently as we pointed out in our deep-dive for Club members last week. The yield on the 10-year Treasury meaningfully pulled back to under 3% and near its lowest levels since May. Looking back Constellation Brands (STZ) reported better than expected quarterly earnings on Thursday, and CEO Bill Newlands did a good job that evening on “Mad Money,” explaining the momentum in the beer business and why the share conversion agreement with the Sands family is a great deal for shareholders. It was a busy week for economic data. Monday brought the durable goods report, which indicated a 0.7% monthly increase in May — ahead of the 0.2% monthly advance expected. We also got the pending home sales report for the month of May, which pointed to a 0.7% monthly gain, a nice surprise versus expectations for a 3.9% monthly decline. However, sales were still down 13.6% annually. On Wednesday, the final reading for first quarter gross domestic product pointed to a 1.6% annualized contraction, greater than 1.5% contraction expected. On Thursday, initial jobless claims for the week ended June 25 came in at 231,000, missing expectations of 229,000. May personal spending results were also released on Thursday and indicated a 4.7% annual increase in the core PCE price index, the Fed’s preferred measure of inflation, slightly lower than the 4.8% expected and a welcome deceleration versus the 4.9% rate seen in April. On Friday, the Institute for Supply Management said manufacturing activity in June was weaker than expected, with its index of national factory activity dropping 53 for the month, the lowest reading since June 2020. What’s ahead No portfolio companies are issuing financial results in the week ahead. There are just a couple of other quarterly reports to watch — kind of the calm before the storm of earnings season, which unofficially kicks off with JPMorgan Chase (JPM) on July 14 . But before we get ahead of ourselves, the coming week promises to be a big week for economic numbers, including Friday’s jobs report. Monday, July 4 Markets closed for Independence Day Tuesday, July 5 10 a.m. ET: Factory Orders Wednesday, July 6 10 a.m. ET: ISM Services PMI 2 p.m. ET: FOMC Minutes Thursday, July 7 Before the bell: Helen of Troy (HELE) After the bell: Levi Strauss (LEVI), WD-40 (WDFC) 8:15 a.m. ET: ADP Employment Survey 8:30 a.m. ET: Initial Claims Friday, July 8 8:30 a.m. ET: Nonfarm Payrolls Report (Jim Cramer’s Charitable Trust is long QCOM, NVDA, MRVL, AMD and STZ. See here for a full list of the stocks.) As a subscriber to the CNBC Investing Club with Jim Cramer, you will receive a trade alert before Jim makes a trade. Jim waits 45 minutes after sending a trade alert before buying or selling a stock in his charitable trust’s portfolio. If Jim has talked about a stock on CNBC TV, he waits 72 hours after issuing the trade alert before executing the trade. THE ABOVE INVESTING CLUB INFORMATION IS SUBJECT TO OUR TERMS AND CONDITIONS AND PRIVACY POLICY , TOGETHER WITH OUR DISCLAIMER . NO FIDUCIARY OBLIGATION OR DUTY EXISTS, OR IS CREATED, BY VIRTUE OF YOUR RECEIPT OF ANY INFORMATION PROVIDED IN CONNECTION WITH THE INVESTING CLUB. NO SPECIFIC OUTCOME OR PROFIT IS GUARANTEED.
A trader works on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE), June 27, 2022.
Brendan McDermid | Reuters
The first day of the new month, the third quarter and the second half of the year ended on a positive note Friday, heading into a long holiday weekend. The stock market is closed on Monday for July 4th. Perhaps, it’s a welcome breather after Wall Street on Thursday wrapped up a terrible first half of 2022.
The S&P 500 posted its worst six-month start to a year since 1970. From January to the end of June, the broad market index lost nearly 21% and fell into bear market territory, defined as a drop of more than 20% from a prior high, which was a record in early January.
