The New York Stock Exchange ended Tuesday in mixed order in a hesitant market after a volley of mixed corporate results.
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The Dow Jones index rose 0.31% to 33,733.96 points, the tech-heavy Nasdaq fell 0.27% to 11,334.27 points and the broader S&P 500 index fell 0.07% to 4016.95 points.
The market, which started lower when it opened, “wobbled today,” observed Spartan Capital’s Peter Cardillo.
“Morning selling equaled profit-taking” after two sessions of solid gains, “while investors digested the flurry of earnings news from large companies,” the analyst added.
These were mixed, particularly announcements of expected activity for 2023, but overall “seven strike forecasts out of 12 groups” that released their quarterly reports on Tuesday, he said.
After the close, Microsoft, which was down slightly 0.22%, rose 4.12% to $252 around 11:20 am.
For the second quarter of its staggered fiscal year, the IT group has certainly announced declining but better than expected results. In particular, activities in the cloud (remote computing) brought in more sales than expected.
Alphabet, Google’s parent company, lost momentum (-1.98% to $99.21) after the US government’s decision to prosecute the Internet giant for having a “monopoly” in the online advertising market. The government’s initiative was “generally expected,” commented Peter Cardillo.
The Department and eight US states, including California and New York, are asking the courts to order the Californian company for violating competition laws, seeking damages and ordering it to stop its activities related to the sale of online advertising space.
Among the big companies that announced their results, 3M (-6.16% to $115.07), a constituent of the Dow Jones, said it was preparing for economic difficulties this year and would lay off 2,500 of its 95,000 employees , which employs it worldwide .
The diversified group, which makes medical devices as well as tape rolls and sticky notes, saw sales decline 6%, mostly due to currency effects. Quarterly net income fell 60% to $541 million.
The US defense company Lockheed Martin (+1.82 percent to $449.32) confirmed that it expects sales to stagnate in 2023, but after a fourth quarter slightly better than expected.
Meanwhile, competitor Raytheon (-3.34% to $99.46) benefited from the ongoing recovery in air travel in the fourth quarter, announcing a major order for surface-to-air missile systems for Ukraine.
US oil services group Halliburton posted annual earnings growth on strong demand for its services and equipment, helped by the rise in hydrocarbon prices in 2022. However, its stock fell 1.77% to $39.85.
For its part, General Electric (+1.17% to $80.71) delivered better-than-expected quarterly results, buoyed by the continued activity of its aerospace division. The company posted net income of $2.1 billion in its most recent quarter, better than expected.
Finally, Johnson and Johnson Laboratories reported September-December sales of $23.7 billion (-4.4%), below the average analyst forecast.
Sales of J&J’s Janssen COVID-19 vaccine were nil in the United States for the last three months of the year. The title remained stable on the stock exchange.
At the start of Tuesday’s session, a large number of company listings were suspended for 10 minutes due to a technical issue before resuming as normal, the New York Stock Exchange said.
This disruption affected stocks such as Verizon, AT&T, McDonald’s, Wells Fargo and Eli Lilly.
In the bond market, yields on 10-year notes fell to 3.46%.