A soft start for the ASX today and for the week after the ASX 200 futures market saw an 11 point dip at the close on Friday.
Eurozone shares fell 0.2% on Friday following weaker than expected business conditions surveys for August, but the US markets were higher with the S&P 500 up 0.3% to a new record high helped by stronger than expected business surveys and home sales.
The mixed global lead saw ASX 200 futures down 11 points, or 0.2%, pointing to the weak start today.
The week was mixed, like Friday.
US shares rose 0.7% to a new record high and Chinese shares rose 0.3% but Eurozone shares fell 1.2% and Japanese shares lost 1.6% after strong gains in the previous week.
Australian shares eased 0.2% after a 0.14% dip on Friday.
There were strong gains in Australian IT, health and consumer discretionary stocks over the week but these were offset by weakness in consumer staple, energy, and financial stocks.
Bond yields fell but oil, metal, and iron prices rose. The $A fell slightly as the $US rose and ended at 71.61 US cents.
Wall Street saw fresh records on Friday in the wake of the supported by positive economic data, but it was less than convincing with low trading volumes because of the summer holidays and continuing uncertainty about the wider market’s strength.
The S&P 500 closed at a new record after its longest winning streak since December 27, 2019 when the market rose for five straight weeks.
The Dow rose 190.60 points, or 0.7%, to close at 27,930.33, and the S&P 500 added 11.65 points, or 0.3%, to end at 3,397.16, its second record close of the week.
The Nasdaq also closed at a fresh high of 11,311.80, up 46.85 points or 0.4%, after touching a new intraday record high at 11,323.71.
It was the Nasdaq’s 36th record close in 2020.
For the week, the Nasdaq rose 2.7%, the S&P 500 added 0.7%, and the Dow was flat.
Apple ended the week at a market value of $US2.02 trillion, the first time a stock has ended a week at that level.
