Dow streak of record closes ends at 12
On Day 13 the Dow rested. The Dow Jones industrial average’s streak of record high closes was snapped at 12 on Tuesday, ending its best run of fresh peaks in 30 years.
The Dow fell 25.20 points, or 0.12%, to close at 20,812.24. Still, the blue chip stock gauge rose nearly 950 points, or 4.8%, in February.
The streak had garnered a lot of attention and publicity on Wall Street, where investors have been pushing both stock prices and valuations up on the strength of a solid U.S. economy and optimism that President Trump would be able to bolster growth even more by getting some planks of his probusiness agenda, such as a big tax cut for corporations and massive spending on infrastructure, passed into law. The Dow rose 13 consecutive days to start the year in 1987.
Still, despite the strong reading on U.S. consumer confidence in February — the best since summer 2001 — investors were unwilling to make ever bigger bets on the Dow ahead of Trump’s highly publicized speech to Congress late Tuesday.
Trump’s address was being billed by Wall Street as his most important for markets since he has taken office. Given that stock prices have run up on expectations Trump will deliver on his campaign promises, investors say it is important for him to offer more specific details about his economic plans and find some common ground with fellow Republicans. Wall Street fears the president’s economic-focused agenda might get sidetracked by other initiatives, which would put the stock rally in jeopardy.
How the financial markets react to Trump’s nationally televised address when trading resumes Wednesday will be closely watched to see if investors still have faith in key things such as corporate tax reform getting done in a timely manner.
Investors also appear to be pricing in higher odds of a rate hike from the Federal Reserve at its meeting in March.