STOCK EXCHANGE: Wall Street is looking for a direction – GDP grew less than expected at the end of the year

On Thursday, concerns about the durability of the cease-fire weighed on exchange rates around the world. For the past two days, the United States and Iran have been communicating conflicting information about the details of the ceasefire agreement.

President of the United States Donald Trump has frankly expressed his dissatisfaction that the Strait of Hormuz has not been opened despite the ceasefire. Spokesperson for Iran’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs Saeed Khatibzadeh said Thursday that the Strait of Hormuz was open to “everyone,” but ships had to coordinate with Iranian authorities before passing through the strait. According to several sources, traffic in the strait has not increased since the ceasefire began.

Iran has demanded that the ceasefire also apply to Lebanon. Israel has continued to bomb Lebanon despite Iranian demands.

Wall Street opened moderately lower on Thursday after a day of gains on Wednesday.

Moments after Wall Street opened, the broad S&P 500 index was down 0.1 percent. The Dow Jones index of large companies, on the other hand, fell by 0.3 percent.

The technology-focused Nasdaq also opened with a slight decrease of 0.1 percent, but turned to an increase of 0.08 percent shortly after the start of trading.

US consumer incomes fell

Several different economic figures were published from the United States on Thursday.

The US gross domestic product grew by 0.5 percent in the fourth quarter of last year. The growth was more moderate than forecast, as the gross domestic product was expected to rise by 0.7 percent.

In February, US consumer income unexpectedly fell by 0.1 percent. Forecasts expected a 0.3 percent increase in income. Last week, the number of unemployment compensation applications was higher than expected. 219,000 new unemployment benefits were applied for.

However, private consumption grew by 0.5 percent in February. Consumption was predicted to grow by 0.6 percent. The PCE floor price index for private consumption grew by 2.7 percent in the last quarter of 2025.