Stocks Showing A Lack Of Direction In Morning Trading - U.S. Commentary

(RTTNews) - With traders digesting the European Central Bank's highly anticipated monetary policy announcement, stocks are showing a lack of direction in morning trading on Thursday. Despite the choppy trading, the major averages set new record intraday highs.

Currently, the major averages are on opposite sides of the unchanged line. While the Nasdaq is up 12.01 points or 0.2 percent at 5,405.77, the Dow is down 2.52 points or less than a tenth of a percent at 19,547.10 and the S&P 500 is down 0.69 points or less than a tenth of a percent at 2,240.66.

The lackluster performance on Wall Street comes after the ECB said its asset purchase program is being extended longer than anticipated but also said it will slow the pace of purchases.

The ECB said it decided to continue its asset purchases at the current monthly pace of 80 billion euros until the end of March of 2017.

From April of 2017, the asset purchases are intended to continue at a monthly pace of 60 billion euros until the end of December 2017, or beyond, if necessary

In his subsequent press conference, ECB President Mario Draghi argued the reduction does not qualify as "tapering" and said the option of scaling back bond purchases to zero was not discussed by policymakers

Draghi stressed that the asset purchases could be expanded or extended if the economic outlook worsens in the future.

On the U.S. economic front, the Labor Department released a report showing that initial jobless claims pulled back in the week ended December 3rd after reaching a five-month high in the previous week.

The report said initial jobless claims fell to 258,000, a decrease of 10,000 from the previous week's unrevised level of 268,000. The drop in jobless claims matched economist estimates.

Most of the major sectors are showing only modest moves, although considerable strength is visible among networking stocks. The NYSE Arca Networking Index has surged up by 1.8 percent to a fifteen-year high.

Ciena (CIEN) is leading the networking sector higher, spiking by 14.3 percent despite reporting weaker than expected fourth quarter results.

Housing and oil service stocks are also seeing some strength on the day, while weakness is visible among railroad and biotechnology stocks.

In overseas trading, stock markets across the Asia-Pacific region moved mostly higher during trading on Thursday. Japan's Nikkei 225 Index surged up by 1.5 percent, while Hong Kong's Hang Seng Index rose by 0.3 percent.

The major European markets have also moved to the upside following the ECB announcement. While the German DAX Index has jumped by 1.5 percent, the French CAC 40 Index is up by 0.7 percent and the U.K.'s FTSE 100 Index is up by 0.3 percent.

In the bond market, treasuries have pulled back after moving notably higher in the previous session. As a result, the yield on the benchmark ten-year note, which moves opposite of its price, is up by 5.1 basis points at 2.398 percent.