Investors had a lot to be thankful for last week as the major markets traded to fresh all-time highs. The Nasdaq gave the markets a belated Christmas gift on Thursday as it crossed the threshold of 9000 for the first time.
The gains were largely consistent at the sector level as all but Utilities closed higher for the week. Consumer Discretionary held the greatest gains with a return of 1.48% with Information Technology not far behind with 1.11%.
This increase in retail sales was buttressed by the SpendingPulse report from MasterCard which reported a 3.4% year over year increase in retail sales, excluding autos. Online Sales grew even more with an increase of 18.8% compared to last year. The late Thanksgiving holiday was highlighted as a factor in retail stores utilizing omnichannel sales earlier in the season to recoup lost gift buying time in brick and mortar stores.
However, the gains were not as consistent when looking across capitalizations. Small Cap and Value stocks continued to underperform as these segments experienced losses last week.
With only hours of trading left in 2019, overall, the markets look to record one of the better returns in history. As we look forward to 2020, we’d like to wish you a Happy New Year.
______________________________________________
The S&P 500® Index is a capitalization index of 500 stock-designed to measure performance of the broad domestic economy through changes in the aggregate market value of stock representing all major industries.
https://us.spindices.com/indices/equity/sp-500
The Dow Jones Industrial Average® (The Dow®), is a price-weighted measure of 30 U.S. blue-chip companies. The index covers all industries except transportation and utilities.
https://us.spindices.com/indices/equity/dow-jones-industrial-average
The NASDAQ Composite Index measures all NASDAQ domestic and international based common type stocks listed on The NASDAQ Stock Market. Today the NASDAQ Composite includes over 2,500 companies, more than most other stock market indexes. Because it is so broad-based, the Composite is one of the most widely followed and quoted major market indexes
https://indexes.nasdaqomx.com/Index/Overview/COMP
The MSCI World Index, which is part of The Modern Index Strategy, is a broad global equity benchmark that represents large and mid-cap equity performance across 23 developed markets countries. It covers approximately 85% of the free float-adjusted market capitalization in each country and MSCI World benchmark does not offer exposure to emerging markets.
The MSCI Emerging Markets (EM) Index is designed to represent the performance of large- and mid-cap securities in 24 Emerging Markets countries of the Americas, Europe, the Middle East, Africa and Asia. As of December 2017 it had more than 830 constituents and covered approximately 85% of the free float-adjusted market capitalization in each country.
The S&P GSCI Crude Oil index provides investors with a reliable and publicly available benchmark for investment performance in the crude oil market.
https://us.spindices.com/indices
Companies in the S&P 500 Sector Indices are classified based on the Global Industry Classification Standard (GICS®).
https://us.spindices.com/indices