Stock market today: Live updates

A balanced portfolio will be “paramount” in 2024, according to Merrill, a Bank of America company.

While the Wall Street firm anticipates choppy markets next year as the Federal Reserve attempts a soft landing for the economy, it expects stocks will continue to rise, and even meaningfully rally in the later part of the year.

“We believe the next couple of months will bring the beginning of a long rotation in Equities that includes a move up in areas that have significantly lagged and areas that are well placed for a more substantive rally later next year,” read a note from the chief investment office.

In fact, the firm expects leadership will continue to broaden out beyond the mega-caps. It said it has a slight preference for value over growth, given attractive valuations, and while it has a neutral outlook for small caps, it said investors should keep an eye on the asset class.

“Our portfolio strategy remains ‘balanced’ while fully invested to start the year, as we believe that adjustments below the surface in terms of Value and Growth, Small- and Mid-capitalization shares versus Large-capitalization, and U.S. versus non-U.S. (including Emerging Markets) are paramount in 2024.”

— Sarah Min, Michael Bloom

Cathie Wood’s flagship ARK Innovation ETF has been trimming its Coinbase stake for three straight days.

On Tuesday, Wood dumped 65,297 shares of the crypto exchange for ARKK, according to Ark Invest’s daily update. She also sold 15,502 shares for ARK Next Generation Internet ETF as well as 1,456 shares for Ark Fintech Innovation ETF.

Shares of Coinbase have rallied nearly 300% this year, so Wood could be taking some profit in the name to fund other purchases. Coinbase is still ARKK’s biggest holding, with a 10.6% weighting.

— Yun Li

Stocks moved little on Wednesday, with investors preparing for the last Federal Reserve policy decision of 2023.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average hovered near the flatline, while the S&P 500 ticked up 0.06%. The Nasdaq Composite 0.3%.

— Brian Evans

Wholesale prices were unchanged in November, providing another piece of positive inflation news, according to a Labor Department report Wednesday.

The producer price index was unchanged for the month, against the Dow Jones estimate for a 0.1% increase. Excluding food and energy, the index also was flat versus the forecast for a 0.2% increase. Excluding food, energy and trade services, the PPI rose 0.1%.

On a year over year basis, the headline index was up just 0.9%; excluding food, energy and trade, it increased 2.5%.

—Jeff Cox

These are some of the stocks making notable moves in premarket trading:

• Tesla — Shares fell 1.2% after U.S. safety regulators said the electric vehicle maker will recall more than 2 million vehicles to fix issues with its driver assistance system.
• Pfizer — The biopharmaceutical stock dropped 7.4% after issuing full-year guidance.  Pfizer said it would see an impact on earnings from its acquisition of Seagen, a biotechnology company focused on cancer.
• Roblox — Shares of the video game company rose 1.5% on the back of a Wells Fargo initiation at overweight. 

See the full list here.

— Alex Harring

Pfizer shares traded more than 7% lower in the premarket after the pharmaceutical giant issued new guidance for 2024.

The company expects revenue to range between $58.5 billion and $61.5 billion. That’s below a StreetAccount consensus of $62.66 billion. Pfizer also said it sees about $8 billion in revenue from its Covid vaccine and treatment.

Shares of Tesla fell more than 1% in the premarket on news that the EV maker is recalling more than 2 million vehicles to rectify an Autopilot defect. The move comes after years of regulators investigating several crashes that took place while Autopilot was in use.

Unemployment rate in South Korea spiked to its highest level since July, according to data released by the government.

The jobless rate in South Korea rose to 2.8% on a seasonally adjusted basis last month, higher than the 2.5% in October.

Data also showed the country’s economy added fewer jobs in November at around 277,000, compared with prior month’s 346,000 additions.

South Korea’s unemployment rate had reached a record low of 2.4% in August.

— Shreyashi Sanyal

Argentina has sharply devalued its currency and cut subsidies for energy and transport as part of economic shock measures that new Economy Minister Luis Caputo said were aimed at fixing the country’s worst crisis in decades.

The peso was weakened by about 56% to 800 pesos to the dollar, from 366.5 before the move took effect. The Argentinian blue dollar – referring to cash dollars bought and sold informally – traded at 1050 to the dollar.

Caputo said the plan was needed to cut the fiscal deficit and bring down triple-digit inflation.

Argentina’s annual inflation rate stood at 143% in October. The country is also grappling with a fiscal deficit, as well as a $45 billion debt to the International Monetary Fund.

— Associated Press

Business sentiment in Japan improved more than expected among large manufacturers, according to the Bank of Japan’s quarterly Tankan survey.

The Tankan reading for big Japanese manufacturers climbed to +12 from +10, beating the +10 estimated by economists in a Reuters poll.

Meanwhile, reading for big non-manufacturers’ rose to +30 from +27, improving for the seventh quarter in a row and also higher than the +27 expected by the Reuters poll.

A positive index reading indicates optimistic respondents outnumber pessimistic ones.

— Lim Hui Jie

The November producer price index set for release Wednesday morning is expected to show a rise of 0.1%, up from a 0.5% decline the prior month, according to economists polled by Dow Jones. Excluding food and energy, it’s anticipated to have risen 0.2%, up from a flat reading the previous month.

The data is due out 8:30 a.m. ET.

— Sarah Min

The Federal Reserve is widely expected to hold steady on interest rates when its two-day meeting concludes at 2 p.m. ET.

The real action – and potential market mover – will be how central bank policymakers proceed from here and whether its messaging will hold any clues on the next steps for rates.

Economists and traders will have an eye out for the central bank’s statement, which should have the details on how the Federal Open Market Committee is perceiving the state of employment, inflation and economic growth.

This time, the Fed will also issue its dot plot, a grid of members’ projections for the fed funds rate. This is where market participants might get some insight on where policymakers stand on the expected timing of cuts.

Fed Chair Powell’s press conference, which traders will watch closely, will also offer additional context on the Fed’s decision – as well as where policy may go from here. The event could be a market-moving one.

Read more about the Fed’s big decision here.

–Darla Mercado, Jeff Cox

The CBOE Market Volatility Index that tracks expected moves in the S&P 500 over the next 30 days but is commonly thought of as Wall Street’s “fear gauge,” dropped another 4.5% to 12.07 on Tuesday, a level that BTIG technical analyst Jonathan Krinsky said was the lowest close since Nov. 2019. “It feels as though ‘not a creature is stirring’,” Krinsky wrote in a midday note on Tuesday.

Stocks have rallied since Halloween, and Krinsky noted that, “Uptrends can clearly sustain longer than many anticipate, but given where the VIX is and some of these divergences, we would stay on our toes here.”

Conditions may soon mimic those in early 2018, when both the VIX and the S&P 500 rose at the same time after the VIX traded below 9 in Nov. 2017, “which led to a ‘blowoff’ of sorts into late January … Should markets stay bid into year-end, that scenario would gain some credence,” Krinsky wrote.

— Scott Schnipper, Michael Bloom