US stocks tread water after fresh records

New York, Sept 12, 2025 (AFP)
Wall Street stocks were little changed Friday, a day after all three major indexes hit fresh records on hopes of a Federal Reserve interest rate cut next week.
The Dow Jones Industrial average ticked down 0.1 percent to 46,064.29, while the S&P 500 Index was flat at 6,584.71.
The tech-focused Nasdaq Composite Index inched up 0.1 percent to 22,066.72.
"The market's taking a little bit of a breather" after Thursday's highs, said Steve Sosnick of Interactive Brokers.
The new records on Thursday came after the US consumer price index, a key inflation gauge, rose 2.9 percent on-year in August.
This was in line with analysts' expectations while initial jobless claims jumped too -- reinforcing hopes that the Fed would lower rates at its next meeting from September 16-17 to boost the economy as the labor market weakened.
Markets generally expect a 25 basis points rate cut next week, taking the benchmark lending rate to a range between 4.0 percent and 4.25 percent.
But Sosnick is not convinced that the reduction will herald a new cycle of rate cuts given that inflation has been ticking up and remains notably above the Fed's longer-run two percent target.
He expects the central bank to reiterate the idea that policymakers need to see some improvement on price hikes before slashing rates further.
Among individual companies, Warner Bros Discovery shares increased 6.8 percent after the Wall Street Journal reported that Paramount Skydance is preparing a majority cash bid for the company. On Thursday, the company's shares surged more than 28 percent.

Sumber : AFP