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Investing.com — U.S. stock markets fell sharply again at the open on Thursday, extending the losses made on Wednesday on fears that the Federal Reserve will start to reduce its monetary stimulus within a matter of weeks.
Expectations of a ‘tapering’ of bond purchases were strengthened by another post-pandemic low in weekly initial jobless claims. Initial claims fell to 348,000, a sharper drop than expected and further evidence to suggest progress in the labor market’s recovery. The numbers indicated that the surge in Delta-variant Covid-19 cases across the U.S. hasn’t yet led to an increase in layoffs, despite signs of weakness in the travel sector in particular.
By 9:40 AM ET (1340 GMT), the Dow Jones Industrial Average was down 164 points, or 0.5%, at 34,797 points. The S&P 500 was also down 0.5% and the Nasdaq Composite was down 0.6%.
Robinhood (NASDAQ:HOOD) stock was one of the heaviest fallers in early trading, losing 8.2% after its quarterly results as a public company showed a wider-than-expected loss and also contained a warning of a likely slowdown in revenue growth after a buoyant quarter.
Department store stocks were in vogue, with Macy’s (NYSE:M) stock rising 12% and Kohls (NYSE:KSS) stock rising 5.8% after quarterly results that testified to pentup demand returning to physical stores. Also supporting sentiment toward the sector was a Wall Street Journal report that Amazon (NASDAQ:AMZN), which has done more than anyone to destroy the department store business model, is now thinking about establishing something similar to department stores itself. The report appears to bolster the argument for physical presence on Main Street. Estee Lauder (NYSE:EL) stock rose 2.1% after the cosmetic group, too, cashed in on the reopening trends of the second quarter.
