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U.S. stock indexes fell Tuesday, building on two consecutive losing sessions, as investors parsed fresh economic data and braced for tightening monetary policy.
The S&P 500 shed 1.4%. The tech-focused Nasdaq Composite lost 1.5% and the Dow Jones Industrial Average retreated 1.2%.
Stocks began selling off Friday after Federal Reserve Chairman
Jerome Powell
said the central bank must continue raising interest rates and hold them at a higher level until it is confident inflation is under control. This ran contrary to some investors’ prior expectations that the Fed would ease the pace of rate increases due to worsening economic data and easing inflation figures.
The comments led investors to bet on another aggressive rate increase at the September meeting. Futures bets show that traders see a roughly 75% probability that the Fed will raise interest rates by another 0.75 percentage point at its next meeting, according to
Investors tend to sell stocks and government bonds when financial conditions are tightening.
New economic readings released Tuesday morning came in better than expected, appearing to confirm fears the Fed could feel comfortable continuing its aggressive rate-raising campaign. American attitudes toward jobs and the economy brightened in August from the month prior, the Conference Board’s consumer-confidence index showed. Job openings grew in July, the Labor Department reported Tuesday morning. The U.S. recorded a seasonally adjusted 11.2 million job openings in July, up from the month prior.
Meanwhile, home-price growth slowed in June as higher mortgage rates made homeownership less affordable, according to the latest figures from the S&P CoreLogic Case-Shiller National Home Price Index, which measures average home prices in major metropolitan areas across the nation.
Bond yields rose, a sign that investors are reassessing how high interest rates will go. The yield on the two-year Treasury note, which is more sensitive to near-term Fed policy expectations, ticked up to 3.478% from 3.427% Monday. The benchmark 10-year Treasury yield edged higher to 3.132% from 3.109% Monday. Yields and prices move inversely.
The selloff in stocks was broad, with all 11 sectors of the S&P 500 in negative territory. Nearly every component in the blue-chip Dow industrials traded lower.
On the earnings front,
and
shares rose 3% and 5.6%, respectively, after the retailers reported quarterly results that beat consensus analyst expectations. Still, the companies warned of a pullback in spending as consumers contend with hot inflation.
Elsewhere, shares of
fell 9%, retreated from a 25% rally from Monday, ahead of a strategic update due before the market opens Wednesday. The stock has seen wild swings this year amid a frenzy of trading among individual investors.
Traders worked on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange on Monday.
Photo:
Michael M. Santiago/Getty Images
In energy markets, Brent crude, the international benchmark for oil prices, fell 2.8% to $100.02 a barrel.
The WSJ Dollar Index, which measures the dollar against a basket of 16 currencies, weakened by 0.2%, with currencies like the euro and the British pound gaining against the greenback.
Overseas, the pan-continental Stoxx Europe 600 rose, led by gains in the technology sector. Major indexes in Asia were mixed, with China’s Shanghai Composite and Hong Kong’s Hang Seng each declining less than 0.5%. South Korea’s Kospi added 1%, and Japan’s Nikkei 225 rose 1.1%.
Write to Caitlin Ostroff at caitlin.ostroff@wsj.com
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