Wall Street opened the session in negative territory, with the Dow Jones index losing 0.73% to 52,402.57 points, the S&P 500 falling 0.29% to 7,652.06 points and the Nasdaq dropping 0.30% to 26,339.87 points. Among the companies that fell the most were UnitedHealth, with a decline of 1.96%, Nike, which fell 1.97%, P&G, which slipped 1.91%, Goldman Sachs, which slid 1.72%, and Walt Disney, which retreated 1.51%. On the positive side, Chevron rose 2.39%, Salesforce gained 1.43%, IBM increased 0.88%, Cisco added 0.24% and Boeing advanced 0.23%.
The stock market decline was driven by the rise in oil prices, with Brent crude reaching $100 and Texas WTI settling at $95.70, up 2.79% and 2.88% respectively. This escalation in prices is related to the worsening of geopolitical tensions in the Middle East, coupled with a higher-than-expected rise in producer prices in China.
Market analyst Ramiro Loureiro from Millennium Investment Banking noted that the market is eagerly anticipating the unveiling of new iPhones from Apple. In the technology sector, Meta Platforms launched an AI assistant called "Muse," which promises to automate tasks such as online shopping, buying movie tickets, scheduling appointments and filling out forms, initially available to users in the United States.
The macroeconomic environment brings fears of greater aggressiveness in monetary policies by central banks, on the eve of the ECB making its announcement, with the market anticipating a 25 basis point rate hike for the Eurozone. In the foreign exchange market, the euro strengthened 0.22% against the dollar, settling at 1.1649 dollars.
