Last Week's Recap
The US Market - All three indexes registered their fifth straight winning month
The S&P 500 closed at a fresh record, registering its best first-quarter performance in five years with a 10% gain. The Dow advanced 5.6% during the period for its strongest first-quarter performance since 2021.
The Nasdaq slipped 0.3% on a weekly basis. However the tech-heavy index popped 9% for the first quarter. For March, all three averages posted positive performances, it was the fifth straight winning month for them.
Fed Chair Jerome Powell repeated that the US central bank isn’t in any rush to cut interest rates as policymakers await more evidence that inflation is contained. The Fed’s preferred gauge of underlying inflation cooled last month.
Moreover, Bitcoin made headlines with a 66.58% up in the first quarter. And, the Nikkei 225 index jumped 20.9%, outperforming US indices.
The US Sectors & Stocks - All S&P 500 sectors gained in March
All S&P 500 sectors ended March in positive territory. Tech was still lifting the market higher in the quarter, but its influence has waned in March, and other sectors have also seen strong advances.
The technology sector was the biggest winner in the first quarter with a 12% gain, and it rose 2.88% in March. Driven by NVIDIA, it soared 82.5% for the quarter and gained 14.2% in March alone.
Market breadth has been expanding as the energy sector was the best outperformer for the S&P 500 in March with an 8.7% up, followed by the basic materials and utilities sectors, having respectively gained 7.8% and 6.03%.
On the other hand, only sector down this quarter is real estate, off by 3% in the period.
9 of the top 10 market-cap companies rose in the first quarter. Nvidia (NVDA) performed the most brilliantly, followed by Meta Platforms (META) and ELi LiLLy (LLY), rising 37.18% and 33.46%, respectively.
With a 11.88% gain, Microsoft (MSFT) surpassed Apple (AAPL) as the top market cap in the US market. AI-related chip stocks TSMC (TSM) and Broadcom (AVGO) entered the top 10 market values.
While Apple (AAPL) fell double digits in the first quarter as concerns about weak iPhone demand and regulatory headwinds weighed.
Tesla (TSLA) tumbled nearly 30% in the first quarter, with its market cap was below $560 billion, out of the top 10. Tesla will report its first-quarter vehicle deliveries on April 2. Analysts are also expecting Q1 vehicle deliveries to be well below Q4 2023's record 484,507 and more forecasts will be around 420k to 430k.
Trump Media & Technology Group (DJT), parent of Truth Social, began trading on the Nasdaq following a long-delayed reversed merger. Shares skyrocketed nearly 68% last week, with former President Donald Trump owning nearly 60%.
Reddit (RDDT) tumbled after CEO disclosed he sold 500,000 shares and COO disclosed she sold 514,00 shares. The stock has soared since it debuted and still closed a weekly gain of 7%.
Viking Therapeutics (VKTX) surged 18% after its weight-loss pill helped patients lose up to 5.3% of their body weight over 28 days.
Hong Kong Market - HSI lost nearly 3% in the first quarter
The Hang Seng Index dropped by 2.97% in the first quarter, ranking at the bottom among major global stock indices. This decline comes after four consecutive years of losses, a surprising loss amid a global stock market rally. However, the benchmark index was slightly up 0.18% in March.
Despite disappoint performance, there was a net inflow of HK$133.1 billion from mainland investors in the first quarter, reaching a recent high of HK$85.9 billion in March.
In terms of sectors, the best-performing industries in the first quarter were daily consumer goods, with a quarterly increase of 3.8%, followed by materials and telecommunications services. Among stocks with a market capitalization of over 100 billion, the largest declines were seen in the biopharmaceutical, real estate, and financial sectors. Companies like WuXi AppTec were most affected, with stock prices dropping by 53% due to the impact of US biopharmaceutical legislation.
Xiaomi (1810.HK) kicked off sales of its first electric vehicles-SU7 with aggressive pricing. The Xiaomi car app shows that all 5000 units of the Xiaomi SU7 Founder’s Edition have been sold out. March 28, Xiaomi ADR rose more than 10%.
Singapore Market - STI lost 0.5% for the first quarter
Singapore stock markets posted a slight loss of 0.5% for the first quarter of 2024, against the global stock market rally. However, the benchmark registered a 2.62% gain in March and STI was slightly up during the holiday-shortened week.
Singapore’s core inflation quickened in February as expected on seasonally stronger demand around the Lunar New Year. The core measure, which excludes housing and private transportation costs, accelerated to 3.6% last month from a year ago, official data showed Monday. That was slightly faster than the median 3.4% gain expected in a Bloomberg survey of economists, and compares with 3.1% in January.
Singapore’s factory output grew 3.8% in February, extending gains from January’s revised figure of 0.6% growth, data from the Economic Development Board (EDB) .
DBS Group(D05.SI) is confident of achieving a return on equity (ROE) of 15-17% in the medium term or over the next three to five years, its chief executive officer Piyush Gupta said on March 28.
Australian Market -ASX 200 closed at a record high
The Aussie stock market closed at a record high on the last trading day of the first quarter. ASX 200 was very bullish rallying 4.14% in Q1 and 2.44% in March.
For the holiday-shortened week, the benchmark was up 1.59% to close at 7896.9 points, as the bull market was continuing to broaden.
While the big banks have already rallied hard, rising resource prices helped the miners to join the optimism action.
The payment of some large dividends by companies including Telstra, BHP and Commonwealth Bank likely also added to investor firepower, with possibly more than usual transferring the cash into their broking accounts to get more of the positive market action.
Gold stocks were also buoyed by the rising gold price, with the giant Newmont (ASX: NEM) seeing its shares rally to lead the sector higher.
The Week Ahead
Macro Factors - Fed officials speeches and March jobs data
Wall Street is looking forward another solid quarter. March jobs data release on Friday will highlight the first trading week of April. Economists' average estimate is for growth of 180,000 nonfarm payrolls, versus a 275,000 gain in February. The unemployment rate is expected to have dipped slightly, to 3.8% from 3.9%.
Federal Reserve officials, including Governors Cook, Bowman, Kugler, and Vice Chair Quarles, are scheduled to deliver speeches in the week ahead, with Fed Chair Powell set to speak on April 3rd at Stanford University about the economic outlook. Investors will be keenly watching for clues about interest rate cuts from these speeches.
Historically speaking, in 10 out of 11 prior instances when the S&P 500 registered a first-quarter gain of 10% or more, the broad market index was higher for the remainder of the year, according to Ryan Detrick, chief market strategist at Carson Group.
Still, many investors do see some digestion of gains after the recent rally and the remainder of the year could get more volatile. But others expect any slide in the second quarter will be a more of a healthy pullback in what is still expected to be an upwardly trending market.
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