On Thursday, stocks declined in turbulent trading as investors considered a slew of significant quarterly reports and remained focused on the bond market, where Treasury rates are continuing to rise.
Thursday saw a peak for the benchmark 10-year Treasury yield of 4.239%, reaching levels not seen since 2008. As the Federal Reserve works to quell inflationary pressures not seen in decades, rising rates have been a headwind for stocks this year.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 90.22 points, or 0.30%, to 30,333.59. At session highs, the Dow was up nearly 400 points, but stocks fell as Treasury yields increased. The Nasdaq Composite fell 0.61% to 10,614.84. The S&P 500 dropped 0.80% to 3,665.78. Stocks have fallen for the second day in a row, but the major averages are still up more than 2% for the week.
"As long as official policy is to make the stock market go down, so that people are less wealthy, so that they buy fewer things, so that prices stop going up, all while doing nothing about fiscal policy, we believe the correct posture is to be bearish on stocks and bullish on inflation," Greenlight Capital's David Einhorn told CNBC.
With AT&T and IBM surging 7.7% and 4.7%, respectively, after exceeding expectations on the top and bottom lines for their most recent quarter, several positive earnings releases helped limit losses for the market.
On the negative side, Tesla shares fell more than 6% after the electric vehicle manufacturer revealed Wednesday night that it anticipates missing its 2022 delivery goal. The business also reported quarterly sales that fell short of analysts' predictions.
Many strategists are doubtful the market will sustain a gain in the near term, despite the fact that the third-quarter earnings season has so far been better than anticipated, in part because of the environment of rising Treasury yields.
"Our guess is that earnings will be good enough to keep the market in a trading range, but not enough to send it back up to its midsummer high and given the lagged nature of monetary policy, we would argue that time is not on the market's side. We would note that US rates continue to push out to new cycle highs, helping the USD trounce its peers," Michael Shaoul of Marketfield Asset Management noted.
On Thursday, the dollar reached its highest level against the Japanese yen since 1990.
