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Weekly Market Wrap: May 15, 2015 Friday, May 15, 1:55 PM ET The nineteenth full trading week of 2015 comes to a close with the Dow Jones, S&P 500 and NASDAQ composite all slightly lower in early afternoon trading.
Most actively traded stocks include Applied Materials (AMAT) up 2%, Bank of America (BAC) down 1.15%, and Apple (AAPL) lower by 0.4%.
The S&P 500, Dow Jones and NASDAQ were all higher in the last five days of trading.
Crude oil futures are lower this week, trading at $59.40 per barrel on Friday afternoon.
And Gold futures are higher this week, trading at $1224.57 an ounce this afternoon.
In economic news, the U.S. Census Bureau announced that advance estimates of U.S. retail and food services sales for April, adjusted for seasonal variation and holiday and trading-day differences, but not for price changes, were $436.8 billion, virtually unchanged from the previous month, but 0.9 percent above April 2014. Total sales for the February 2015 through April 2015 period were up 1.5 percent from the same period a year ago. The February 2015 to March 2015 percent change was revised from +0.9 percent to +1.1 percent. Retail trade sales were down 0.1 from March 2015, and 0.1 percent below last year. Food services and drinking places were up 8.5 percent from April 2014 and nonstore retailers were up 6.3 percent from last year.
In the week ending May 9, the advance figure for seasonally adjusted initial claims was 264,000, a decrease of 1,000 from the previous week's unrevised level of 265,000. The 4-week moving average was 271,750, a decrease of 7,750 from the previous week's unrevised average of 279,500. This is the lowest level for this average since April 22, 2000 when it was 266,750.
The Producer Price Index for final demand fell 0.4 percent in April, seasonally adjusted, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported. Final demand prices moved up 0.2 percent in March and decreased 0.5 percent in February. On an unadjusted basis, the index for final demand declined 1.3 percent for the 12 months ended in April.
In April, more than 70 percent of the decrease in final demand prices can be attributed to a 0.7-percent decline in the index for final demand goods. Prices for final demand services edged down 0.1 percent.
Within intermediate demand, prices for processed goods fell 1.1 percent, the index for unprocessed goods moved up 0.9 percent, and prices for services advanced 0.5 percent.
In corporate dividend news, Union Pacific Corporation (NYSE:UNP) has declared a quarterly dividend of 55 cents per share on the company's common stock, payable June 30, 2015, to shareholders of record May 29, 2015.
The Dow Chemical Company (NYSE:DOW) has declared a dividend of 42 cents per share, payable July 30, 2015, to shareholders of record on June 30, 2015.
American Express Company (NYSE:AXP) approved a $0.03 - or 12 percent - increase in the quarterly dividend on the company's common stock. The dividend was raised to $0.29 per common share, from $0.26, payable on August 10, 2015 to shareholders of record on July 2, 2015.
3M (NYSE:MMM) declared a dividend on the company's common stock of $1.025 per share for the second quarter of 2015, payable June 12, 2015, to shareholders of record at the close of business on May 22, 2015.
ConocoPhillips (NYSE:COP) announced a quarterly dividend of 73 cents per share, payable June 1, 2015 to stockholders of record at the close of business on May 22, 2015.
Clorox Company (NYSE:CLX) increased the quarterly cash dividend on the company's common stock by 4 percent, from 74 cents to 77 cents per share. The dividend will be payable on Aug. 7, 2015, to stockholders of record as of July 22, 2015.
Pitney Bowes (NYSE:PBI) has declared a quarterly cash dividend on the company's common stock of $0.1875 per share. The dividend will be paid on June 12, 2015, to stockholders of record on May 29, 2015.
This is the 'Weekly Market Wrap' for Friday May 15, 2015.
Please join us on Monday for the Week Ahead Market Report.
For MarketNewsVideo.com, I'm Sayoko Murase. | |
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