The Dow Jones Industrial Average quickly erased a 200-point loss to get in the green during the early trading session on Monday.
The index was able to slough off early losses due to declines in shares of Boeing, which fell as much as 8 percent following a deadly crash of an Ethiopian Airlines 737 MAX shortly after takeoff on Sunday. The crash marks the second deadly crash for the 737 MAX 9 jet–one of Boeing’s best-selling airplanes–within the last five months.
As of 11:10 a.m. ET, the Dow was up over 100 points, while the S&P 500 was up 1 percent and the Nasdaq Composite gained 1.36 percent.
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Monday’s market moves come after the major indexes posted their worst weekly performance for 2019 following fears of a global economic slowdown creeping into investors’ minds. Last Friday’s employment report showed weaker-than-expected jobs creation.
The Labor Department said that 20,000 jobs were added in February, falling well below a Dow Jones poll of economists who were expecting 180,000. It marked the weakest month of job creation since September 2017, stoking more fears of a global economic slowdown.
In spite of the latest numbers, White House economic advisor Larry Kudlow said that the U.S. economy is still on pace to realize a 3 percent gain. Furthermore, analysts and economists have been quick to point out that government data has been inconsistent since the 35-day shutdown, which delayed the release of data.
“Right now, we’re still waiting to get enough consistent data so we can assess what’s going on. At this point, these numbers don’t do that,” said Ward McCarthy, chief financial economist at Jefferies. “In some respect, it’s not dissimilar to the December retail sales numbers that were so weak they weren’t believable.”
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Last week’s fall in equities saw a return to safe haven assets like bonds and precious metals. In the meantime, investors were eagerly anticipating any positive news from the latest U.S.-China trade negotiations.
“The most recent economic data fits with our 2019 outlook that suggests economic growth is likely to slow this year but recession prospects remain very low,” said Bruce Bittles, chief investment strategist at Baird, in a note. “This reinforces the view that the Federal Reserve will continue with patience with regards to any future rate hikes until such time that underlying economic fundamentals show significant improvement.”
“As a result, the current weakness in the equity markets should be viewed within the confines of a consolidation phase,” he said.
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