Wall Street Close: Bears tighten grips on FOMC Minutes, coronavirus woes

• US equity benchmarks extend Tuesday’s losses with more power.
• FOMC Minutes back tapering concerns, hints at dissatisfaction from employment recovery.
• Lowe’s benefit from upbeat earnings, US housing data disappoints.
• US Jobless Claims, covid updates will be in focus for immediate direction.

Wall Street closed in red for the second consecutive day by the end of Wednesday’s North American session as neither the Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) Minutes nor qualitative catalysts offered any relief to the markets. On the contrary, downbeat housing data added to the bearish impulse.

Read: Forex Today: Dollar retains its strength post-FOMC Minutes

Minutes of the July Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) meeting also exerted downside pressure on the risk appetite as it marked divergence from the policymakers’ comments favoring the monetary policy adjustments. In addition to shedding the rate hike concerns, despite supporting the tapering, the dissatisfaction of employment recovery also portrayed pessimism at the Fed.

On the other hand, geopolitical concerns relating to Afghanistan and the fact that the US leads the world in reported COVID-19 cases and deaths, per Reuters, also weigh on the market sentiment.

Furthermore, a drop in US Housing Starts, in contrast to upbeat Building Permits, for July also troubled the market players and weighed on the US stocks.

That said, the Dow Jones Industrial Average (DJI) and S&P 500 dropped the most since July, down 1.08% and 1.07% respectively to 34,960 and 4,400. Further, Nasdaq dropped for the second consecutive day, by 0.89% or 130 points to 14,525.

It’s worth mentioning that the US Treasury yields remained lackluster, mildly up, whereas commodities traded mixed ahead of Thursday’s Asian session.

Lowe’s jumped over 9.0% following a positive surprise from Q2 earnings and Salesforce.com also marked around 1.5% daily gains on revised price target from the key US banks. Above all, shares of Werewolf Therapeutics jumped 13% following the deal with Merck.

Looking forward, weekly jobless figures from the US and risk catalysts will be the key factors to watch for fresh impulse as investors digest the key data/events that already passed.