By Caroline Valetkevitch
NEW YORK (Reuters) – Global stock indexes fell on Wednesday as Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell said the fight to lower inflation still has a “long way” to go, while grains prices jumped on worries about crop shortfalls around the globe.
The U.S. dollar was lower and Treasury yields were little changed.
After lifting interest rates by 5 percentage points since March 2022, the Fed this month took a breather to assess the effects of its actions. Investors broadly expect increases to resume at the Fed’s July meeting.
While Powell’s congressional testimony to lawmakers on Capitol Hill Wednesday underscored the view that the U.S. central bank will hike rates further, some investors saw the comments as less hawkish than they had expected.
While noting that inflation remains very far from the Fed’s target, Powell said it may make sense to move rates higher, at a more moderate pace.
Also, late in the session, Atlanta Federal Reserve President Raphael Bostic said in written remarks and an interview on Yahoo Finance that the Fed should not raise rates further or it would risk “needlessly” sapping the strength of the U.S. economy.
The Nasdaq led declines on Wall Street, and S&P 500 technology was among the worst-performing sectors.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 102.35 points, or 0.3%, to 33,951.52, the S&P 500 lost 23.02 points, or 0.52%, at 4,365.69 and the Nasdaq Composite dropped 165.10 points, or 1.21%, to 13,502.20.
The pan-European STOXX 600 index lost 0.50% and MSCI’s gauge of stocks across the globe shed 0.37%.
The Fed is “walking a tight rope between trying to tell people they are going to fight inflation as their No. 1 priority and yet not pushing the market so far as to create problems in the banking system and just a general feeling that things are in bad shape,” said Rick Meckler, partner of Cherry Lane Investments in New Vernon, New Jersey.
Treasury yields initially rose on Powell’s hawkish tone but were last little changed. Benchmark 10-year notes were down 0.2 basis points to 3.725%, from 3.727% late on Tuesday.
The U.S. dollar index briefly rose following the release of Powell’s testimony, but was last down slightly.
The dollar index fell 0.458%, with the euro up 0.67% to $1.0989.
In commodities, U.S. corn, soybean and wheat futures rose to multi-month highs amid concerns about crop shortfalls around the globe.
Oil prices gained with the rally in corn and soybean prices and as the dollar declined.
Brent futures rose $1.22, or 1.6%, to settle at $77.12 a barrel, while the U.S. West Texas Intermediate (WTI) crude futures rose $1.34, or 1.9%, to settle at $72.53 a barrel. Both contracts hit two-week highs earlier in the session.
(Reporting by Caroline Valetkevitch; additional reporting by Medha Singh, Lawrence White and Wayne Cole; Editing by Jacqueline Wong, Lincoln Feast, Alex Richardson, David Goodman, Richard Chang and Cynthia Osterman)
