Major market benchmarks cut their gains in late afternoon trading on Thursday after The Wall Street Journal reported that Pfizer (NYSE: PFE) has ran into supply-chain issues and will only be able to deliver half of the coronavirus vaccines the drugmaker planned for by the end of 2020. The Dow and Nasdaq, however, were able to settle with gains, but the S&P 500 fell slightly lower from its recent highs.
According to the WSJ, Pfizer will only be able to deliver 50 million vaccines globally, compared to its previous estimates for 100 million. However, investors were still encouraged by the U.K. approving Pfizer's vaccine for emergency use. The U.S. is also expected to approve the vaccine next week, with plans to roll out doses immediately following the Food and Drug Administration's approval.
Wall Street is also encouraged by positive signals for Congress over additional stimulus before the year's end. On Thursday, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell stated that a bipartisan agreement is "within reach."
Meanwhile, new weekly jobless claims fell by a greater-than-expected margin in the Labor Department's latest report, with new claims totaling 712,000 for the week ended Nov 28. Continuing jobless claims also fell to a nine-month low of 5.52 million. Yet, the number of individuals claiming unemployment benefits in all programs, including the pandemic's relief program outlined in the CARES Act, remains at a historic 20.2 million.
Separately, the Institute for Supply Management's November service sector purchasing managers' index (PMI) declined to 55.9 from October's 56.6. However, this decrease was better-than-expected and marked the sixth straight month that the index remained in expansion territory.
Here's how the market settled on Thursday:
S&P 500 Index (NYSE: SPY): -0.06% or -2.29 points to 3,666.72
Dow Jones Industrial Average (NYSE: DIA): +0.29% or +85.73 points to 29,969.52
Nasdaq Composite Index (NASDAQ: QQQ): +0.23% or +27.82 points to 12,377.18
For Stocks, Warner Bros. (NYSE: T) shook up the U.S. theater sector on Thursday, announcing that it will release all of its 2021 films on HBO Max the same day they debut in theaters in a pandemic-induced one-year plan. Shares of large theater operators like AMC Entertainment (NYSE: AMC) and Cinemark (NYSE: CNK) fell deeply into negative territory following the news.
For Sector Performance, sectors ended Thursday's session mixed, with more winners than losers at closing bell. Energy (NYSE: XLE) with the biggest gainer, rising over 1%, while Real Estate (NYSE: XLRE) and Industrials (NYSE: XLI) rounded out the top three. Utilities (NYSE: XLU) slipped the most into negative territory, falling over 1%,
For Commodities and Currency, the U.S. Dollar (NYSE: UUP) fell to its weakest level in over 2 years on Thursday as Congressional lawmakers continued to make more positive progress toward additional stimulus and vaccine momentum kept investors optimistic towards speedy economic recovery. The dollar index, which compares the greenback to other global currencies, fell 0.5% to 90.574, but fell as much as 90.554 during the session. Gold (NYSE: GLD) continued to rise as the dollar fell and investors sought to hedge against possible inflation. Spot gold increased 0.4% to $1,838.83 per ounce, while gold futures settled 0.6% higher at $1,841.10 per ounce. Crude oil futures rose on Thursday after OPEC+ agreed to increase output production by 500,000 barrels per day (bpd) starting in January. This will bring the total production cuts for the start of 2021 to 7.2 million bpd. International benchmark Brent Crude (NYSE: BNO) gained 1.4% to $48.92 per barrel, while West Texas Intermediate (NYSE: USO) rose 0.8% to $45.64 each.
For Friday, market participants will focus on November's jobs report, as well as various coronavirus headlines.