Fed Meeting Minutes Limit Market Gains

Stocks ended higher on Wall Street after a day of wavering as minutes from the Federal Reserve’s last meeting of policymakers underscored how the central bank remains determined to keep rates high to crush inflation. The S&P 500 rose 28.83 points, or 0.8%, to 3,852.97. The Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 133.40 points, or 0.4%, to 33,269.77.
The Nasdaq rose 71.78 points, or 0.7%, to 10,458.76. Stocks had rallied earlier after the government reported that the number of job openings in November was higher than expected, which bolsters hopes that the economy can avoid sliding into a protracted recession, the AP reports. The strong jobs market helped insulate a weakening economy from slipping into a recession in 2022.

The minutes from the mid-December meeting show that Fed officials remained determined to keep rates high and have taken little comfort from inflation’s decline from a peak of 9.1% in June to 7.1% in November. Banks, companies that rely on consumer spending, and communication services stocks helped lift the market. Citigroup rose 2.6%, Starbucks added 3.6% and Netflix gained 4.9%. Energy stocks fell as the price of US crude oil settled 5.3% lower. Investors cheered several companies that decided to make cuts to their workforces as they face weaker demand. Cloud computing software company Salesforce rose 3.6% after it announced it is laying off about 10% of its workforce. Video hosing platform Vimeo rose 4% after reportedly notifying workers about job cuts

Coinbase jumped 12.2% following the announcement of a $100 million settlement with New York State over what regulators called failures in the cryptocurrency trading platform’s systems for spotting possible criminal activity. GE Healthcare Technologies climbed 8% in its market debut. The latest update on job openings is the first set of employment data that Wall Street will get this week. The government will release its weekly unemployment report on Thursday and its closely watched monthly employment report, for December, on Friday. (More stock market stories.)