It was another consequential week for market participants as the final trading days of August came to a close. There were a couple of important news items on the schedule in addition to testimony from Fed Chair Warsh and news generated from the Jackson Hole Symposium.

On Wednesday, the Core PCE Price Index for July was released, increasing 0.2 percent. This was in line with expectations and an increase from the 0.1 percent growth experienced in June. Although this is higher than the Fed would like, the number is somewhat counterbalanced by the fact that the Fed sees solid GDP growth for the rest of the year.

On that note, preliminary GDP data for the second quarter of 2026 suggests that the economy grew by 1.5 percent during that time period. While this is somewhat disappointing on the surface, consumer spending remained steady, which is why the Fed thinks that growth is just around the corner.

Thursday saw the release of unemployment claims data for the last seven days. During that time, there were 203,000 requests for benefits. This was lower than the expected 208,000 claims and slightly lower than the 207,000 claims from a week ago.

The University of Michigan released their consumer sentiment and inflation expectation reports on Friday. Consumer sentiment was at 51.7 compared to an expected 51 while inflation expectations were down to 4 percent compared to 4.3 percent when the most recent data was first released.

During prepared remarks in Wyoming, Fed Chair Warsh expressed concern about consistent price increases. However, he didn’t provide any concrete guidance related to where rates might go in the future. It’s thought to be unlikely that there will be any rate increases before 2027, but that’s impossible to say without any hints from the Fed Chair himself.

The S&P 500 was up 69 points this week to close at 7,711. This was an increase of about 0.9 percent over the last five trading days. Over the last month, the index has gained just over 4 percent. For the week, the index made a low of 7,640 on the open of trading Monday and made a high of 7,767 on Friday afternoon.

Like the S&P 500, the Dow was up this week finishing 0.45 percent higher to close Friday’s trading at 53,559. Over the last 30 days, the Dow is up about 2.5 percent. This week, the index made a low of 53,330 on Monday afternoon and a high of 53,810 on Friday afternoon.

Finally, the Nasdaq was up 1.89 percent this week to finish at 26,402 at the end of trading Friday. For the month, the index is up just under 6 percent. For the week, the index made a low of 25,929 at the open of trading Monday and a high of 26,683 on Friday.

In international news, Australia revealed on Tuesday that inflation was up 1 percent in July and was up 3.5 percent on an annualized basis. This was slightly above expectations of a 0.9 percent increase in July and an annualized rate of 3.3 percent prior to the release. Japan announced on Thursday night that its inflation rate was 1.8 percent on an annualized basis in July. Finally, on Friday, Canada announced that its GDP grew 0.3 percent in July, which was slightly above expectations.

The upcoming week will be another interesting one as the August jobs report will be released on Friday. The ISM Manufacturing PMI and the JOLTS report come out on Tuesday while the ISM Services PMI comes out on Friday. Unemployment claims for the week will be released on Thursday.

This was another consequential week for market participants. First, the minutes from the most recent FOMC meeting came out and revealed a voting group that may be in favor of rate hikes in the near future. The Treasury also announced that it was expanding its capacity to buy back older bonds from $2 billion to $4 billion. Although the amount itself is too small to impact markets, there was a lot of concern surrounding the announcement.
Many were calling this another version of quantitative easing (QE), however, this is not actually the case. This is because the Treasury cannot create money, so it’s not doing any sort of easing of existing policy. Furthermore, the Treasury currently has $31 trillion in outstanding bonds. Therefore, buying back $4 billion is basically a rounding error in the grand scheme of things.

However, gold went up, the dollar fell and bond yields moved sharply simply because of what market participants felt about what they were being told. It’s likely that existing pessimism around the economy and the potential of future rate hikes were the true drivers of investor angst.

In other news, unemployment claims were down slightly this week to 206,000 from 212,000 last week. Analysts had expected about 210,000 claims prior to the announcement’s release.

On Friday, the Flash Manufacturing PMI and Flash Services PMI came out. Manufacturing came in at 53.2 compared to an expected 53.9, which was identical to last month’s reading. Services came in at 56.8 compared to an expected 54 while last month’s reading came in at 54.6.

The S&P was down 1.22 percent this week to close at 7,674 on Friday. This was a loss of 94.88 points over the past five trading days. For the month, the market is up 2.64 percent. This week, it made a high of 7,777 on Monday morning before reversing and sliding to a low of 7,640 on Thursday afternoon.

The Dow lost 282 points this week to close Friday’s trading at 53,277. This was a loss of 0.53 percent over the last five trading days. It is up 2.41 percent over the last month. This week, the index made a high of 53,665 on Wednesday and a low of 52,788 on Thursday.

Finally, the Nasdaq was down 2.27 percent this week to close at 26,180 at the end of trading Friday. This was a decrease of 607 points over the last five trading days. For the month, the index is still up about 2 percent. During the last five days, the index made a high of 26,789 on Monday morning and a low of 26,033 on Thursday afternoon.

Gold continued its hot streak in August this week climbing to a fresh monthly high of almost $4,600 an ounce. However, it is still far from its yearly high of $5,500 an ounce set in February. Silver was also up big this week hitting nearly $70 an ounce on Friday before retreating.
The upcoming week will surely be another interesting one as a number of important news announcements are on the calendar. On Wednesday, the Core Price Index for July will be released along with preliminary GDP data from the second quarter of 2026.
On Friday, the preliminary benchmark payrolls revision for 2026 comes out. This is the difference in the number of jobs reported and the number of jobs that are found to actually exist. Last year, payrolls were reduced by 818,000, and this year, the gap is expected to widen to 911,000.