Market Summary Week Ending 30/07/2023

The US Federal Reserve agreed on Wednesday to raise interest rates a further 0.25% to tackle persistent inflation figures, a move fully priced in by the markets showing renewed optimism after a prolonged pause from the Federal Reserve and following positive results from recent CPI data releases.

This continued on Friday with the release of the Personal Consumption Expenditure (PCE) Price Index, the Federal Reserve’s preferred gauge of measuring inflation. The data showed that prices have continued to cool with core CPE coming in at 4.1% for the 12 months to July, against analysts’ expectations of 4.2%. This follows CPI data announcements made earlier in the month placing US CPI at 3% for the 12 months to June.

As a result, all three major US indices notched weekly gains with the Dow Jones average up by about 0.66% and the S&P 500 and Nasdaq also both making gains of 1.01% and 2.02% respectively across the trading week.

In the UK the FTSE 100 continued its strong recent run scoring its third weekly gain in a row, with a 0.24% increase across the trading week. There were strong gains in the pharmaceutical sector with AstraZeneca climbing 3.3% across the trading week following news that it had beaten its quarterly profit forecast.

All eyes this week will be watching the decision made by the Bank of England and their latest interest rate decision on Wednesday (2 August), with analysts predicting that the Monetary Policy Committee will take the decision to increase the central rate by a further 0.25%.

Please note for this weekly summary, we focus on the major indices within the financial markets such as the FTSE 100 (UK) and the Dow Jones and NASDAQ (US) to provide a factual account of what has happened within a certain index. Performance figures quoted are factual from the previous week’s trading and this summary is for commentary purposes only.

The performance of these indices is not a representation of an individual fund or portfolio. Past performance is no guarantee of future returns. The value of your investment can go down as well as up. You could get back less than you originally invested.