Wall Street closes in red and the Nasdaq index falls 1.82%

Wall Street closed this Thursday in red, with a 1.82% drop in the Nasdaq index, as fear persisted in the market that a high interest rate environment in the United States could lead to a recession.

At the end of operations on the New York Stock Exchange, the Nasdaq, which groups technology companies, stood at 13,224 units.

The main indicator of the New York stock market, the Dow Jones Industrial Average, fell 1.08% to 34,070 points, and the selective S&P 500 fell 1.64% to 4,330 points.

The US Federal Reserve on Wednesday dictated a pause in the path of interest rates but presented projections that suggest another increase before the end of the year, and suggested that the high rate environment may persist for some time.

Investors also received data from the labor market today that continues to reflect its strength: unemployment benefits fell last week to 201,000, its lowest volume since January, and lower than estimated.

The waning appetite for risk led to strong stock market sales and, in parallel, to the rise in Treasury debt yields: in 10-year papers it stood at 4.49%, and in 2-year papers, at 5.19%, its highest level in 15 years in both cases.

On the other hand, the shadow of another possible government shutdown looms at the end of this month due to the difficulty between legislators from both parties in agreeing on the budget for key items such as defense.

All sectors finished lower, led by real estate (-3.48%), non-essential goods (-2.88%) and basic materials (-2.05%).

Among the 30 Dow Jones companies, the biggest losses were for Cisco (-3.89%), which announced this Thursday the largest purchase in its history, of the cybersecurity company Splunk for $28 billion.

Dow Inc (-2.78%), Nike (-2.61%), Caterpillar (-2.36%) and Visa (-2.17%) also fell.

In other markets, Texas oil fell to $89.63 per barrel, and at the close of trading the 10-year bond rose to 4.492%, gold fell to $1,939.9 per ounce and the dollar gained ground against the euro, with an exchange rate of 1.0658.