Wall Street indices opened under pressure on Friday, after US President Donald Trump announced Kevin Warsh, a known “inflation hawk”, as the next Federal Reserve chair.
In the early minutes of trade, S&P 500 was down 0.29%, or 20.14 points, at 6,945.79, whereas the tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite slipped 0.26%, or 61.58 points, to 23,623.54. The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 0.42%, or 204.93 points, to 48,866.63 at 9:58 a.m. EST.
Apple was among the key drags in the first hour of trading, with its stock falling over 1% to $252.18. The slide came even as the company posted strong quarterly results, with earnings per share of $2.84 beating LSEG consensus estimate of $2.67.
Sandisk, a Wall Street darling over the past year, saw its stock popping over 20% after it shared a solid guidance. The company projected third-quarter adjusted earnings in the range of $12 to $14, far exceeding the consensus estimate of $5.11 per share of analysts tracked by FactSet.
Chevron was also among the early gainers, as record oil production powered its quarterly earnings to higher than analysts’ projection. The oil giant logged adjusted earnings of $1.52 per share, surpassing the LSEG consensus estimate of $1.45 a share. The stock was up 1.21% at $173.21 at 10:15 a.m. EST.
Meanwhile, metals stayed in the red after Wall Street opened, with US spot gold trading 6.05% lower at $5,048.1 an ounce, and silver trading 13.9% lower at $99.6. In the crude basktet, Brent futures were up 0.46% at $69.91, whereas the West Texas Intermedia futures were trading 0.38% higher at $65.67.
The crash in the metals market, along with the weakness seen in the equity market, is linked to Warsh being named as the new Fed chair, a section of analysts claimed. Warsh, known for his hawkish views as a Fed governor between 2006 to 2011, is expected to exercise caution in cutting rates amid inflationary pressure.
On the other hand, this development led to the firming up of the greenback, with the US dollar index up 0.5% at 96.77.
Bitcoin, the world’s largest-traded cryptocurrency, was down 2.45% at 82,480.78.
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