Stocks quiet ahead of Fed interest rate update

In New York, the Dow Jones industrial average advanced 56.87 points to 24,386.03 and the S&P 500 index added 8.49 points to 2,659.99 — boosts large enough to take both indices into record territory. The Nasdaq composite index was up 35.00 points to 6,875.08.

Craig Fehr, a Canadian market strategist with Edward Jones in St. Louis, said it was a pretty quiet day for Bay Street and for Wall Street.

“Part of that’s probably a bit of a pause after the action that we saw last week which was pretty heavy with economic data,” he said.

“The other part of it is the markets are probably waiting to see what commentary comes from the U.S. Federal Reserve later this week in terms of what that might signal for monetary policy ahead of 2018.”

The Fed is scheduled to issue an interest rate policy update on Wednesday when it is expected to lift rates by a quarter of a percentage point. It would be the third interest rate hike by the U.S. central bank this year.

Last week, better-than-expected data showed U.S. employers added 228,000 jobs last month and that the unemployment rate remained at a low 4.1%, bullish indicators for the U.S. economy.

In currency markets, the Canadian dollar closed at an average trading price of US77.80¢, up 0.04 of a U.S. cent.

“The loonie is flat at the moment,” said Fehr, which he attributed to last week’s Bank of Canada decision to keep interest rates steady at 1%.

“That dovish statement by the Bank of Canada put a little downward pressure on the loonie, and I think that’s probably emblematic of the bigger story we’re going to see with the loonie as we move ahead.”

On the commodities front, the January crude contract climbed US63¢ to US$57.99 per barrel and the January natural gas contract gained US6¢ to US$2.83 per mmBTU.

The February gold contract down US$1.50 to US$1,246.90 an ounce and the March copper contract was up US3¢ to US$3.01 a pound.