At the meeting held by the Federal Reserve on Wednesday, FED Chair Jerome Powell stated that he is expecting the rate cuts to happen this year, unsure of when it will start. Jerome Powell said he wants to see a little bit more data to start cutting rates and expressed concerns that starting cutting rates too soon may cause inflation to get stickier; however he also mentioned that starting too late might endanger economic growth. According to the CME FedWatch Tool, markets are anticipating a 55% probability of a rate cut on 12 June. Investors reacted to those announcements with enthusiasm which drove the broader index S&P 500 0.51% higher, followed by a 0.58% and 0.2% increase by Nasdaq Composite and Dow Jones respectively.
The share price of the specialty retailer of athletic footwear company Foot Locker (FL) decreased by 30% following the company’s announced loss of $389 million in its fiscal fourth quarter. Moreover, Foot Locker declared the current fiscal year’s earnings per share projection between $1.40-$2.30 which is below the $1.40-$2.30 expected.
Tom Alison, the head of Facebook, announced Facebook is building an upcoming AI model to power all video recommendations. Tom Alison cited that it is part of Meta’s technology roadmap. Meta has been investing heavily in Nvidia’s graphics processing units to further improve the services that the company is offering which eventually leads to an increase in the profitability of the company.
Shares of the retail company Target (TGT) increased by 15% after the company announced a stronger-than-expected fourth-quarter report. They announced $2.98 in earnings per share and $31.92 billion in revenue compared to $2.42 and $31.83 expected.
Author: Kaan Pinar