Stock Market Today: Relief Rally Fizzles Late
Treasury rates stabilized Wednesday, giving stocks some breathing room, but a modest comeback still wobbled into the finish.
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The markets staged a slim, shaky rebound on a Wednesday that was light on data, with the gravitational pull of U.S. Treasuries' rate revival in plain sight.
A day after the 10-year Treasury yield reached 1.567%, putting a scare into the major indexes, it retreated to roughly 1.5% early on in the session ... but clawed its way back to 1.54% by the afternoon.
What did that do to equities?
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It put a lid on technology stocks (-0.1%), which finished with the day's second-worst sector performance. Instead, investors were interested in defense. Utility stocks (+1.5%), consumer staples (+0.9%) and healthcare (+0.8%) led the markets higher, with notable gains coming from the likes of Eli Lilly (LLY, +4.0%), Sempra Energy (SRE, +3.1%) and ConAgra (CAG, +3.0%).
Even so, the major indices coughed up much of the day's progress during the session's final hour. The result was small gains for the Dow (+0.3% to 34,390) and S&P 500 (+0.2% to 4,359), while the tech-heavy Nasdaq finished with a 0.2% loss to 14,512.
Other news in the stock market today:
- The small-cap Russell 2000 also slid into the red shortly before the close, giving up 0.2% to 2,225.
- Dollar Tree (DLTR) surged 16.5% today after the discount retailer said it will begin offering products priced up to $5 in its Dollar Tree Plus stores and will test the $1+ price points in select legacy stores. DLTR also announced that its board of directors has authorized a $1.05 billion-boost to its share repurchase program, bringing the aggregate amount to $2.5 billion. Already in fiscal 2021, the company has repurchased $950 million of its shares, according to Michael Witynski, president and CEO of Dollar Tree.
- Eyewear startup Warby Parker (WRBY) made a splash in its market debut. WRBY went public via a direct listing, an alternative to traditional initial public offerings (IPOs). WRBY stock opened at $54.05 per share, more than 35% above its $40 reference point. Shares gained a little more ground from there, finishing the day up 36.2% to $54.49. There's still a host of companies set to go public over the next several months. Here's a running list of the most anticipated IPOs for the rest of 2021.
- U.S. crude oil futures slipped 0.6% to finish at $74.83 per share.
- Gold futures shed 0.8% to settle at $1,722.90 an ounce.
- The CBOE Volatility Index (VIX) pulled back 2.3% to 22.71.
- Bitcoin prices slid 1.0% to $41.178.28. (Bitcoin trades 24 hours a day; prices reported here are as of 4 p.m. each trading day.)
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