This week has taken us on a roller coaster ride, with a rally at the start, followed by downs and ups. Yesterday, Wall Street ended about 1% lower. Again, it was the oil sector alone that held the fort, while the rest sank into the red. This is due to Opec+' decision to reduce production by 2 million barrels per day.

Actually, the automotive sector also closed in the green, although the reasons are not easy to understand. By the way, Porsche, which has just gone public, has become the most valuable European carmaker on the stock exchange: with a capitalization of €82.65 billion, it is ahead of its parent company Volkswagen (€79 billion) and its peer Mercedes (€57.6 billion). For the record, Tesla ($755 billion in capitalization) weighs as much as the eleven manufacturers that follow it in the ranking (Toyota, BYD, Porsche AG, Volkswagen, Mercedes, General Motors, Ford, BMW, Stellantis, Honda and Ferrari).

But let's go back to today's most important data: The US employment figures for September. They showed that jobs growth cooled in September, but the unemployment rate fell, which means that the Fed has more space to continue its aggressive rate hikes.

The US added 263,000 jobs last month, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, down from 315,000 in August. Meanwhile, the unemployment rate fell to 3.5%, compared with expectations of 3.7%.

The data dashed investors' hopes and sent futures for the three main Wall Street indexes down by between 0.9% for the Dow and 1.9% for the Nasdaq, while US Treasury yields went up.

This comes after a double warning in the semiconductor sector. Advanced Micro Devices (AMD) warned that its third quarter sales were below expectations. The stock lost 4.5% in after-hours trading. At the same time, Korean giant Samsung Electronics also reported results that will not reach expectations for the period. The negative signals sent by the semiconductor industry, which is closely correlated to consumption, do not really bode well for the global economy…

 

Economic highlights of the day:

The dollar is up to EUR 1.0252 and GBP 0.8994. The ounce of gold has lost some ground at USD 1699. Oil is holding on to gains made on the announcement of an Opec+ production cut, with North Sea Brent at USD 95.37 a barrel and US WTI light crude at USD 89.37. The yield on 10-year US debt continues to rise to 3.82%. Bitcoin remains stuck around USD 20,000 per unit.

 

Analyst recommendations:

* Advanced Micro Devices on Thursday issued a revenue forecast for its third quarter that was about $1 billion lower than the previous one, suggesting that the crisis in the semiconductor market continues. The stock lost 5.4% in pre-market trading and several analysts lowered their price targets.

* Twitter - The U.S. state court in Delaware on Thursday suspended until Oct. 28 the lawsuit filed by Twitter in an effort to force Elon Musk to honor his commitment to buy the social network, a court document shows.

* The ESPN television network, a subsidiary of Walt Disney, is about to enter into a major partnership with the sports betting company Draftkings, Bloomberg reported Thursday, citing people close to the matter. In pre-market trading, DraftKings was up 8%.

* Cannabis producers should continue to benefit from President Joe Biden's announcement that all federal marijuana convictions will be overturned. Tilray gained more than 10% in pre-market trading, after jumping 31% the day before, and Canopy Growth gained 7.5%.

* Levi Strauss lowered its annual earnings target after reporting lower-than-expected third-quarter sales, with slowing demand and a stronger dollar adding to concerns about rising costs.

 

Analyst recommendations:

  • C.H. Robinson: Citi cut its recommendation to neutral from buy. PT up 9.8% to $107.
  • CMC Markets: Jefferies remains Buy with a price target reduced from GBp 340 to GBp 275.
  • Douglas Emmett: Piper Sandler downgrades to neutral from overweight. PT up 10% to $19.
  • Equinix: Credit Suisse lowers Equinix's PT to $571 from $716, reiterates Neutral rating.
  • First Citizens BancShares: DA Davidson downgrades to neutral from buy, adjusts price target to $950 from $925
  • Lyft: RBC Capital Markets downgrades to sector perform from outperform. PT up 17% to $16.
  • Medallion: B Riley Securities initiated coverage with a recommendation of buy. PT set to $10.
  • Norfolk Southern: Baird downgrades to neutral from outperform. PT set to $240, implies a 9.6% increase from last price.
  • PepsiCo: UBS adjusts price target to $189 from $192, maintains buy rating.
  • Pinterest: Goldman Sachs upgrades to buy from neutral amid potential revenue growth.
  • Principal Financial: J.P. Morgan downgrades to underweight from neutral. PT down 8.1% to $72.
  • Progressive: Jefferies upgrades to buy from hold. PT up 16% to $142.
  • Rathbones: Jefferies maintains a Hold rating with a price target reduced from GBp 1,800 to GBp 1,720.