Stocks on the New York Stock Exchange closed the week on a high, securing an eighth consecutive weekly gain. This comes after Friday’s release of the Personal Consumption Expenditures (PCE) price index. The Federal Reserve’s preferred inflation gauge showed that inflation is cooling toward the Fed’s 2% target.
The PCE index indicated a 3.2% rise in core prices – excluding volatile categories of food and energy – for November, down from October’s revised gain of 3.4%. This outperformed analysts’ expectations of a 3.3% rise. According to Yahoo Finance’s Jennifer Schonberger, this data gives further room to the Federal Reserve to introduce interest rate cuts next year.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average slipped by 0.1% on Friday, however, this wasn’t enough to prevent the index from holding on for a 0.2% weekly win. Both the Nasdaq Composite and S&P 500 rose 0.2% on Friday, extending their weekly gains. While the tech-heavy Nasdaq gained 1.2% for the week, the benchmark S&P 500 advanced by 0.75% for the week.