News Bulletin
Friday, August 21, 2026
Evening Edition

Economic Numbers:

Time	Event	Actual	Forecast	Previous
Friday, August 21, 2026
9:45	S&P Global Manufacturing PMI (Aug)	53.20	54.00	53.90
9:45	S&P Global Services PMI (Aug)	56.80	53.90	54.60
9:45	S&P Global Composite PMI (Aug)	56.00	54.00	54.50
13:20	U.S. Baker Hughes Oil Rig Count	452.00	456.00	455.00
13:20	U.S. Baker Hughes Total Rig Count	588.00		593.00

Indices

	CLOSE	50 DMA	200 DMA
DJIA	53,277.01	52,590.17	49,554.73
NASDAQ	26,180.45	25,951.00	24,241.96
S&P 500	7,674.37	7,541.19	7,094.81

Earnings Calendar:

(EPS: Earning Per Share / Rev: Revenue / Mkt Cap: market Capital/ BMO: Before Market Opening /AMC: After Market Close)

COMPANY	EPS Act	EPS Fore	Rev Act	Rev Fore	Mkt Cap	Time
Ubiquiti NetworksUBNT:US	4.73	4.48	937.3M	868.35M	$56.03B	AM
BJs Wholesale Club HoldingsBJ:US	1.36	1.17	6.09B	5.92B	$11.55B	AM
AimcoAIV:US	-	-	-	-	$6.45B	PM
Lancaster ColonyLANC:US	-	-	-	-	$3.59B
HUBHUBG:US	-	0.29	-	941.12M	$2.51B
BuckleBKE:US	0.88	0.89	319.8M	315.66M	$2.25B	AM

Market News:

Wall Street closed higher on Friday, even as a bond market sell-off picked up steam again. Sentiment was buoyed by a surge in the materials sector, a rally in cryptocurrency-related stocks, and positive data on U.S. business activity.

But U.S. stocks notched a weekly loss, pressured by the jump in Treasury yields and surging oil prices.

The benchmark S&P 500 added 0.4% to end at 7,674.39 points, the tech-heavy NASDAQ Composite advanced 0.4% to settle at 26,180.46 points, and the blue-chip Dow Jones Industrial Average climbed 1% to conclude at 53,276.81 points.

For the week, the S&P slid 1.4%, the Nasdaq slumped 2.1%, and the Dow fell 0.9%.

The bond market’s roller coaster ride

Much of the attention this week was on the fixed-income space.

Before Wednesday, longer-term U.S. Treasury bonds in particular had been caught up in a sell-off roughly since the Federal Reserve’s July interest rate decision, driven by inflation jitters due to rising oil prices and concerns over the massive amount of debt being issued by mega-cap companies to fund their artificial intelligence infrastructure spending. The 30-year yield on Tuesday hit a 19-year high of 5.337%, while the benchmark 10-year yield took out a fresh 52-week high of 4.748%.

Shorter maturities had fared much better, helped by recent economic data that reduced expectations of imminent Fed rate hikes.

Then, on Wednesday, the U.S. Department of the Treasury said it would increase the size of repurchases of long-dated government debt to at least $4 billion from $2 billion. The surprise intervention led to a rally in long bonds which sent yields sliding. However, much of that advance was wiped out on Thursday and on Friday, suggesting that traders saw the move as only a short-term solution. Fiscal worries sparked by news that U.S. debt had crossed $40 trillion also clouded the mood.

The 30-year yield was last up 3.6 basis points to 5.273%, while the 10-year yield was up 3.5 basis points to 4.733%.

Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent on Thursday tried to provide more relief, telling CNBC that the size of the proposed buybacks could be more than the $4 billion announced and touting a "big toolkit" to bring down yields.

Materials and crypto lift markets

Turning away from the bond market, Wall Street on Friday was boosted by a 2.2% jump in the S&P 500 materials sector. The rise has been underpinned by copper prices breaking records this month on a combination of supply shortages, falling refined output from China, uncertainty around U.S. tariffs targeting copper imports, and massive demand for the metal due to the artificial intelligence infrastructure buildout.

Copper futures on the London Metal Exchange settled at $14,036.50 a ton, while COMEX copper futures were up 1.8% to $6.5823 a pound.

Also boosting markets on Friday were cryptocurrency-related stocks, with Robinhood Markets and Coinbase closing 13.7% and 8.2% higher, respectively, and ending among the top three percentage gainers on the benchmark S&P 500 index. Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies have caught a significant bid this week on the U.S. Treasury’s intervention move and President Donald Trump calling on policymakers to pass clear regulation for the industry.

Elsewhere, Friday’s economic calendar was highlighted by flash purchasing managers’ index (PMI) readings from S&P Global.

As per the data, U.S. business activity growth rose to 56.0 in August, better than the estimate of 54.0 and ticking up from July’s 54.5 figure. It marked the fastest increase since April 2022. The improvement was driven by a strong showing in services sector business activity, which reached its fastest since December 2024. Manufacturing growth, however, hit a five-moth low.

Oil prices head for weekly gains of more than 5%

Turning to the Middle East, the U.S. and Iran remained at an impasse over the Strait of Hormuz. Trump on Thursday vowed an escalation in economic warfare against Iran and called on U.S. allies to help deliver what he said would be an "economic D-Day" for Tehran.

"This is going to be the greatest coordinated economic isolation in the history of the world...It is a one-two punch — we have a blockade and we are going to have the toughest sanctions in history," Treasury Secretary Bessent told CNBC on Thursday.

Iran appeared to dismiss the threat while keeping up sharp rhetoric against the U.S. State media on Friday said Tehran’s response to any new U.S. threats would be "devastating," citing comments made by Major General Ali Abdollahi, the chief of staff of the Iranian Armed Forces.

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