Morgans AM: Tuesday, 24 January 2023

Morgans Financial Limited

US equity markets continued their strong start to 2023, with both the S&P500 and Nasdaq posting their highest settlements since 2 December last year - Dow gained +254-points or +0.76%. Salesforce Inc rose +3.05% following reports that activist investor Elliott Management Corp has made a multibillion-dollar investment in the software company. The broader S&P500 rose +1.19% to 4,019.81 with Information Technology (up +2.28%), Communication Services (+1.78%) and Consumer Discretionary (1.57%) all rising over >1.5% to lead ten of the eleven primary sectors higher. Energy (down -0.20%) was the only primary sector to settle in the red. According to Bespoke Investment Group, the S&P500 closed more than >1% above its 200-day moving average for the first time since April last year and the more than year long downtrend has been broken. The Nasdaq rallied +2.01% to 11,364.41, with Apple Inc up +2.35% after Morgan Stanley nominated the stock among their top picks, saying the China re-opening has “important implications” for demand as well as supply. Spotify Technology SA rose +2.07%, paring an earlier rally of as much as 6.4% after the music streamer said it would axe ~6% of its workforce - the latest in a series of large cuts announced by high-flying technology groups. Chipmakers Advanced Micro Devices Inc (up +9.22%), Nvidia Inc (+7.59%) and Qualcomm Inc (+6.62%) also traded particularly strongly. The small capitalisation Russell 2000 rose +1.25%.