U.S. stock indexes retreated ahead of a busy week of central-bank decisions in major economies.
The S&P 500 fell 0.4% in Monday morning trading, after the benchmark gauge closed last week at its 67th record high of 2021. The Dow Jones Industrial Average, which sits just shy of its own all-time high, slid 0.6%. The technology heavy Nasdaq Composite Index declined 0.3%.
Investors are sitting tight ahead of a monetary-policy decision by the Federal Reserve and announcements from the Bank of England, European Central Bank and
later in the week. The Fed is expected to move more quickly to wind down its bond-buying program and signal that it will raise interest rates next year to tap the brakes on inflation. Data published Friday showed consumer prices increased in November at the fastest annual rate since 1982.
Gregory Perdon,
co-chief investment officer at
said he expects stocks to keep rising even as the Fed tightens monetary policy.
“The classic textbook would be rates up, stocks down,” Mr. Perdon said. “The reality is there’s so much liquidity out there, there’s so much demand to get a return on assets that ultimately we’re going to have to have a much…more aggressive tightening to knock stocks.”
Vaccine makers were among the best-performing stocks in the S&P 500 as the Omicron variant of Covid-19 has increased demand for booster shots. Moderna shares jumped 6.4%, while
advanced 4.4%. Anthony Fauci, chief medical adviser to President Biden, on Sunday encouraged Americans to get Covid-19 boosters, while the U.K. government said it planned to offer a booster shot to every adult in England by the end of the year.
shares rallied 14% after the motorcycle maker said its electric-vehicle division would go public by merging with a special-purpose acquisition company. Shares of the SPAC, AEA-Bridges Impact, climbed 3.8%.
Shares of
soared 84% after the drug maker said it would be bought by Pfizer in a deal valuing the company at $6.7 billion.
In the bond market, the yield on benchmark 10-year Treasury notes ticked down to 1.443% Monday from 1.487% Friday. Yields move in the opposite direction to bond prices.
European and U.K. natural-gas prices jumped more than 9% Monday after Germany’s new foreign minister cast doubt on the imminent startup of a controversial pipeline from Russia, adding to traders’ concerns over slim supplies of the heating and power-generation fuel. U.S. natural-gas futures rose 3.2% to $4.03 per million British thermal units.
Futures on benchmark Brent crude oil fell 0.6% to $74.73 per barrel. The Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries said some of the recovery in oil consumption that the cartel had expected to take place this year would shift into early 2022 due to fallout from the Omicron variant.
Overseas stock markets were mixed. The Stoxx Europe 600 slipped less than 0.1%. In Asia, Japan’s Nikkei 225 rose 0.7%, the Shanghai Composite Index added 0.4% and Hong Kong’s Hang Seng declined 0.2%.
—Alexander Osipovich contributed to this article.
Write to Joe Wallace at joe.wallace@wsj.com
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