Joining Market Domination Overtime, Yahoo Finance Markets Reporter Josh Schafer dissects the day's top trading highlights.

The weekly jobless claims data, released on Thursday, soared to its highest level since August 2023, with an addition of 20,000 jobs lost in a single week.

The utilities sector (XLU) continues to thrive, propelled by increased investments in energy solutions fueled by artificial intelligence.

Additionally, the Dow Jones Industrial Average (^DJI) extended its rally, marking its seventh consecutive day of gains. Amgen (AMGN) emerged as a standout performer, contributing significantly to the index's upward trajectory.

For more expert insight and the latest market action, click here to watch this full episode of Market Domination Overtime.

This post was written by Angel Smith

Video Transcript

Yeah, we've been talking a little bit about the broadening of the stock market rally here at work again.

Right.

And one of the things that we got today was some softer economic data, which has been a trend over the last month when we think about this broadening.

So today we have jobless claims hit its highest level weekly.

Jobless claims, I should say since 2020 August 2023 of course, volatile data set.

Well, and wasn't there, like, wasn't it?

Apparently that a lot of people in New York and Indiana and it might have been spring breaks?

I was notified today that certain contractors for the schools can file for unemployment if there's a break.

So it could have contributed to the up.

It was a big uptick too.

I think that's why we all sort of were caught off guard by a 20,000 uptick in a week is pretty significant.

And jobless claims really hadn't been doing much, but it caught a little bit of attention because we had weaker than expected employment data last week.

Right.

With the April Jobs report.

So people sort of looking for some signs of cooling but even zooming outside of just this one jobless claims number that I think we'll get a clearer picture next week because they're weekly.

Um, so we, we can talk about it again next Thursday.

Right.

But zooming out of that, we have just had a little bit of a string of weaker data, not weak data, but weaker than we had.

Right.

Not crashing, cooling, not crashing data.

And what we've seen come with that is yields have fallen and we've had a little bit more of a broadening out over the last couple of days.

I mean, you look at utilities over the last month now, really even just in May.

Well, you had, you had a good opinion of that Shafer, which was that, I like that piece where you kind of looked at.

Ok.

So what has actually been leading since mid April?

And it was interesting, I mean, it's, it's utilities and staples, it's utilities and staples.

And the interesting thing about that, Josh is I, I talked to some strategists about that yesterday and I said, ok, at a high level, you read that and you think defensive, right?

Are people getting defensive here?

Is that sort of the positioning play?

And then Keith Werner over at Cruz points out to me and goes, well, maybe it's just they're really cheap and when you look at the first, they got so beat up because they got so beat up over the last really two years staples and utilities.

Both two of the worst performing sectors in the S and P 500 over the last two years.

Also, real estate, which we were just highlighting today had a great day real estate.

It's been awful for two years.

So there's a little bit of a movement into just some of the stuff that hasn't done well at all.

Catch up.

There's a couple of other things to mention with utilities that I think are really interesting now first and they share this with real estate, both are very interest rate sensitive also, which is part of the reason they've done so terribly.

But with utilities, there has been an increasing buzz lately.

We've been talking about it a lot around the office that there is this increasing demand for energy because of data centers.

And so even if these companies are not necessarily and their earnings yet, there are plans to build out more data centers, there's a kind of talk around it.

So I wonder if that sentiment wise at least is is lending to some of the games.

It's something that macro strategists have been talking about for.

It feels like a couple months now, slowly pointing it out.

Like look at how much the hyper scalar of the cloud companies, right?

Like a Microsoft or Amazon are spending, who are they spending to?

And a lot of people think it's going to be these energy companies because it takes a lot of energy to operate these GP US.

And so that perhaps benefits utilities, I think for now, right now, a lot of people just aren't sure.

How can you really bake that in?

How can you price that in?

Where is the actual benefit there?

From a fundamental standpoint?

I think it's been a little bit hard to see, but definitely part of the constellation energy record high today on its earnings, utilities and nuclear power and particularly, and Josh, when you talk to, you mentioned the other sector that's been leading since me.

Staples, what were all saying were the drivers there?

Staples seem like a similar trade in the sense that it's just been a laggard.

Um, because I think when you look across staples earnings, there hasn't really been a clear read there into, ok.

Things are, things are going really well for consumer staples or the consumer right now.

That hasn't really been the prevailing take from this earnings season.

Of course, we're gonna get a lot better look at that perhaps next week.

Um But overall, it seems like when you look at staples, it's just really hasn't done well again from a valuation standpoint compared to the S and P. Uh it was entering March at its lowest level in the last couple of years.

So perhaps just opportunity for a little bit of all right, we got one more thing we got to talk to you about and this is a cool one.

And an interesting one.

The Dow has now rallied for what, seven straight session?

And you did a little number crunching on what has done the best.

It's maybe a little bit of a surprise over that period.

Amgen.

Amgen m look it up 14%.

I take a look at the wifi Interactive right now quickly and you can see the components in the down Amgen's up 14%.

Apple's your next stock up 8% Amazon.

So, so some companies there that are perhaps more common, but Amgen really stuck out to me because something we've talked a lot about with this rally over the last year is momentum trades, right?

And you have A I and you have the weight loss drug trade and sort of the rise of E I will even within the S and P 500 sort of helping push that along with that A I trade.

Well, the Dow and the way it's composed, it just isn't always exposed to them like that.

But AM J comes out last week and they say they think that the, uh, that their weight loss drug is gonna do.

Well, the testing went well for it.

Stock goes up big and that's the leader over this seven day run for the dow.

Perhaps entering the weight loss trade gets a taste.