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Market Commentary - Foreign Markets

U.S. stocks dipped as the Fed held rates steady, citing inflation risks. Asia-Pacific markets were mixed while European stocks declined. Treasury yields fell slightly.

Wall Street Closes Lower Amid Fed Concerns; Global Markets Show Mixed Performance

21-Mar-2025, 10:20
The Nasdaq fell 59.16 points (0.3%) to 17,691.63 and the S&P 500 dipped 12.40 points (0.2%) to 5,662.89 while the narrower Dow posted an even more modest loss, edging down 11.31 points or less than a tenth of a percent to 41,953.32.

Wall Street closed modestly lower amid concerns about the economic outlook following the Federal Reserve's decision to keep interest rates unchanged. While officials still anticipate rate cuts later this year, they lowered their 2025 GDP growth forecast to 1.7% from 2.1% and raised this year's inflation projection to 2.7% from 2.5%. Fed Chair Jerome Powell attributed a good part of the higher inflation forecast to tariffs.

NAR said existing home sales surged by 4.2% to an annual rate of 4.26 million in February after tumbling by 4.7% to a revised rate of 4.09 million in January. Airline stocks moved significantly lower, dragging the NYSE Arca Airline Index down by 1.7%. Biotechnology stocks was considerably weak, as reflected by the 1.2% loss posted by the NYSE Arca Biotechnology Index. Networking and computer hardware stocks notably moved downward while most of the other major sectors showed more modest moves on the day.

Asia-Pacific stocks turned in a mixed performance with the Japanese markets closed for a holiday. Hong Kong's Hang Seng Index plunged by 2.2%, while Australia's S&P/ASX 200 Index jumped by 1.2%. Meanwhile, the major European markets all moved to the downside on the day. While the German DAX Index tumbled by 1.2%, the French CAC 40 Index slumped by 1% and the U.K.'s FTSE 100 Index edged down by 0.1%.

In the bond market, treasuries gave back ground after an early rally but closed modestly higher. As a result, the yield on the benchmark ten-year note, which moves opposite of its price, dipped 2.3 bps to 4.23% after falling as low as 4.17%.