Stocks Rally; Pending Home Sales Surge; Durable Goods Orders Mixed

The stock market has come to a close for today, with the S&P 500 climbing 0.31%. In addition, the Nasdaq 100 increased by 0.74%. In the U.S., the most important pieces of economic data came in the forms of the Pending Home Sales report and the Core Durable Goods Orders report.

The housing market had a piece of good news, as Pending Home Sales came in much higher than expected for the month of January. This report measures the change in the number of homes under contract to be sold but still awaiting the closing transaction, excluding new construction.

Economists were expecting a 1% increase but got 8.1% instead. This marks the second consecutive monthly increase thanks to lower mortgage rates during January. However, Pending home sales are lower year-over-year and are unlikely to increase until 2024, according to Economist Lawrence Yun.

Durable Goods Orders, which measures the change in the total value of new orders for long-lasting manufactured goods, including transportation items, fell by -4.5% month-over-month in January versus estimates of -4%. However, when excluding transportation, we get Core Durable Goods Orders, which actually increased by 0.7% versus the 0.1% forecast.