Advanced Search

Share Coverage



Category: Stockmarket / Currency / Futures / Markets

Oil price fall weighs on US stocks

Friday, 8 Jul 2016 06:24:39 | Rebecca Hyam

The major US indices edged lower, but the Nasdaq was moderately higher. (Keith Bedford: Reuters)

A fall in oil prices weighed on energy shares in the US overnight, resulting in a weak finish for Wall Street.

Oil prices lost more than $US2 a barrel, after the US Government reported that crude stockpiles had not declined by as much as the market was expecting.

But encouraging signs for the labour market helped to limit the overall losses.

The ADP national employment report revealed that 172,000 thousand jobs were added in the US private sector last month.

Economists had been expecting 159,000 jobs to have been created in June.

In corporate news, PepsiCo's shares gained 1.5 per cent after the beverage giant reported a stronger-than-forecast second quarter profit.

It also raised its full-year profit outlook.

By the end of the session, the Dow Jones Industrial Average had lost 22 points, or 0.1 per cent, to 17,895.

The S&P 500 edged 1 point lower to 2,097 and the Nasdaq bucked the trend, adding 0.4 per cent to 4,876.

European shares fared better, with London's FTSE 100 Index closing up 1.1 per cent to 6,533.

The local share market was poised to follow Wall Street lower and, at 6:45am (AEST), the ASX SPI 200 was down 0.4 per cent to 5,171.

At the same time, the Australian dollar was buying 74.75 US cents, having edged lower overnight.

On the cross-rates, it was worth 67.51 euro cents, 57.84 British pence, 75.32 Japanese yen and $NZ1.035.

West Texas crude oil had fallen to $US45.17 a barrel, the price of a barrel of Tapis had eased to $US47.72 and spot gold was slightly lower, at $US1,360.66 an ounce.

AustraliaPlus


 

Copyright © 1999- Shanghai Daily. All rights reserved.Preferably viewed with Internet Explorer 8 or newer browsers.

沪公网安备 31010602000204号

Email this to your friend