It is not often that the S&P 500 index futures do not go flat for an entire session, but that is what took place on Thursday. The double whammy of negative reactions to two of the top mega cap technology stocks (Meta Platforms Inc. and Alphabet Inc.) was too much for the index to overcome.
The carnage spilled over into similar issues whether they already reported or not. Off the opening of the regular session, the index fooled investors that it was going to recover, but stopped dead in its tracks just above the lower end of Wednesday’s session and sharply reversed course.
While the index acted as though it found a bottom on several occasions, it was not until heading into the final two hours that the bulls made a stand. By 3:00 PM EST, the bulls had trimmed the losses from 60+ handles to 20 handles, only to falter. Sellers dominated the final 45 minutes and the index ended the day much closer to its low than its high for the session.
The end result was a decline of 53.25 handles at the closing price of 4156.50. The index has now been lower in nine of its last twelve sessions, with one of those outliers being a negligible gain.
Among the top components, there were no winners and therefore the smallest loser, Berkshire Hathaway Class B (NYSE: BRK.B), was the biggest winner. For the session, the issue declined $0.86 or 0.26%.
That performance was just under one percent better than the cash index’s decline of 1.18%.
Conversely, Meta Platforms Inc. (NASDAQ: META) was the biggest loser. Despite a Q3 beat, cautious comments moving forward had investors exiting the issue. For the session, the issue declined by $11.54 or 3.85% at the closing price of $288.36.
