The S&P 500 gained more than 4% last week, its best weekly performance since November 2020.
On Wednesday, the Federal Reserve announced it is raising its fed funds interest rate target by 0.25% to a new range of between 0.25% and 0.5%. The Fed is now projecting six additional rate hikes before the end of 2022 as it attempts to combat inflation.
Shares of Chinese tech stocks Alibaba and Tencent both gained more than 20% on Wednesday after government-backed Chinese news outlet Xinhua News Agency reported that officials plan to provide more support for the Chinese economy, including its critical real estate sector. In addition, the outlet reported that progress has been made on a cooperation plan between U.S. and Chinese regulators on a path forward for U.S.-listed Chinese stocks.
On Friday, the Russian Finance Ministry said Russia has completed $117 million in critical interest payments and has seemingly avoided a historic debt default. The debt payment reports came just one day after credit rating agency S&P downgraded Russia’s foreign and local currency sovereign credit ratings from “CCC” to “CC” and said Russia is “highly vulnerable to non-payment.”
On Tuesday, movie theater company AMC Entertainment announced a puzzling $27.9 million investment to take a 22% stake in Nevada gold and silver mining company Hycroft Mining. Last year, AMC shares surged from under $2 to as high as $72 as part of the so-called “meme stock” trading frenzy that began with Reddit’s WallStreetBets community.
Hidden gem
Shares of Signet Jewelers jumped more than 18% on the week after the diamond seller’s fiscal 2023 guidance of between $8.03 billion and $8.25 billion in sales handily topped consensus analyst estimates.
In the week ahead, investors will get more quarterly earnings reports from Pinduoduo and Nike on Monday, Adobe on Tuesday and NIO on Thursday.
At least 356 S&P 500 companies have mentioned “inflation” during their fourth-quarter earnings calls, according to FactSet.
Economic numbers
Following the Federal Reserve interest rate hike, Wall Street will get more economic updates on Monday when the People’s Bank of China announces its latest interest rate decision and on Wednesday when Fed Chair Jerome Powell speaks at the Bank for International Settlements (BIS) Innovation Summit.