[New York Stock Market Briefing] Mixed Trends Ahead of Employment Report... Nasdaq Rises, Dow Falls

The major indices of the U.S. stock market showed mixed trends. There was a strong wait-and-see attitude ahead of the employment report release.

On the 6th (local time) at the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE), the Dow Jones Industrial Average closed at 44,747.63, down 125.65 points (0.28%) from the previous session. The Standard & Poor's (S&P) 500 Index rose 22.09 points (0.36%) to 6,083.57, and the Nasdaq Composite increased by 99.66 points (0.51%) to close at 19,791.99.

There was a wait-and-see attitude ahead of the January employment report release. The January non-farm payrolls are expected to be 169,000, less than December's 256,000. The number of unemployment claims filed last week slightly increased. New claims were 219,000, up 11,000 from the previous week, exceeding market expectations. Employment conditions influence the decision on the benchmark interest rate.

All of the 'Magnificent 7' except Tesla rose. NVIDIA showed a strong performance of over 3%, indicating some recovery from the Deep Seek Shock. Other major artificial intelligence (AI) and semiconductor-related stocks showed mixed trends. Qualcomm and Arm fell by more than 3%, and AMD also showed a decline of over 1%. On the other hand, Micron and TSMC rose by around 1%.

Amazon, which announced its earnings after the market closed, is showing weakness in after-hours trading. This is because its first-quarter sales forecast fell short of market expectations. Amazon presented a sales forecast of between $151 billion and $155.5 billion, but the market's average expectation was $158.5 billion.

Ford also presented a gloomy outlook for this year's performance, causing its stock to fall by more than 7%. Roblox also fell by about 11% due to the number of daily active users falling short of expectations. On the other hand, Philip Morris's stock jumped by more than 10% on news that its fourth-quarter sales and net income exceeded expectations. Eli Lilly also rose by more than 3% on news of increased sales of its diabetes treatment.

Austan Goolsbee, president of the Chicago Federal Reserve Bank, stated in a public speech that it is