Wednesday's Markets Update (Dec 28, 2022)

29 Dec 2022 by rate3

NASDAQ started Wednesday at 10339 and closed at 10213 (-1.2 percent), while BTC, which was trying to recover during the night (PST) session, followed, going from 16652 to 16518 (-0.8). Economy continues to deteriorate (with November's Pending Home Sales sliding 4.0 percent - 0.9 was expected) and tech bulls were abandoning their defensive positions one by one (the latest was on 10260).

There was something new in the latest National Association of Realtors report - "contract signings declined in all four major U.S. regions" (source: NAR). We have not seen that for a while, as the October data showed that monthly Home Sales got up by 3.3 percent in Midwest (decreased 6.6% this time) while it dropped 4.3 and 6.4 percent in Northeast (-7.9) and South (-2.3), correspondingly. Western Sales declined by 0.9 percent (-11.3 previously) to 55.1 (55.6).

On the positive side (for home owners), after FOMC slowed down a bit, mortgage rate was slightly reverted (f.e. the 30-years-fixed rate got from over 7 percent in Oct to under 6.3 in Dec). So, we can reasonably expect that the next NAR reporting in Jan will show home sales' slight rebound. However, that might only make the situation worser for bulls as premature signs of the recovering real estate market only strengthens Jerome's resolve to carry stocks (and BTC) deeper in the abyss.