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Brendan McDermid | Reuters
Specialist trader Michael Pistillo Jr. wears a dow 23,000 hat, after the dow briefly traded above 23,000, at his post on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange in New York, October 17, 2017.
Shares of Macy’s, Nordstrom and Kohl’s rose more than 1 percent in early trade. Overall, traditional retail stocks have taken a hit this year as more people shift to online shopping outlets, helping Amazon increase its market share.
The SPDR S&P Retail exchange-traded fund (XRT) was down 5.4 percent for 2017 as of Wednesday’s close. U.S. markets were closed on Thursday due to the Thanksgiving holiday.
Equities were set to finish the shortened trading week with modest gains. The S&P 500 and Dow were on track to rise 0.7 percent entering Friday’s shortened session, while the Nasdaq was on track to post a 1.1 percent weekly gain.
Stocks have gotten a boost from rising tech stocks this week. Some investors also placed bets that corporate tax cuts would keep the current economic expansion going, but skepticism remains as to whether the GOP-led Congress will be able to pass a bill before year-end.
“The proposed fiscal stimulus faces another hurdle next week when the Senate takes up its own version of the legislation,” said Jeremy Klein, chief market strategist at FBN Securities.
“I maintain that the implementation of something meaningful is an intractable problem given the concerns surrounding the Federal deficit, the [state and local tax] deduction, and the Affordable Care Act,” Klein said.
