Trading results for 13 February 2025

"Mum, I’ve lost my mind!" – many investors might be screaming this to themselves as they watch the market. It keeps growing higher and higher for no apparent reason, and it’s completely unclear how this might end.

Thursday morning was a logical continuation of Wednesday evening. The mood wavered between sluggish optimism and outright pessimism. Market sentiment was dampened by macroeconomic data on consumer inflation (CPI index), which clearly showed that all the Federal Reserve’s efforts to combat inflation have yet to yield the desired results.

Thursday was expected to bring the second act of this drama, with the release of producer inflation data (PPI index). Market participants had little hope that these figures would differ significantly from the CPI data. As a result, throughout the first half of the day, futures on major U.S. indexes hovered near zero, occasionally dipping into negative territory as a precaution.

Then, miraculously, the PPI index data turned out to be better than expected: inflation in January had even subtly slowed. That slight improvement was enough for investors to forget all their worries and rush to buy stocks again. It was no surprise that trading opened in positive territory, with indexes holding onto gains of about 0.5% for several hours after the previous day's close.

However, another cloud loomed over the market – Trump’s promise to unveil his plan for implementing so-called retaliatory tariffs on Thursday. This worried market participants, causing buying activity to wane by mid-session, with a correction seemingly in the making. But Trump wouldn’t be Trump if he didn’t know how to keep everyone on edge while doing nothing substantial. He did indeed present his tariff plan to the public – but postponed its implementation until at least 2 April. The market breathed a sigh of relief: "Phew, dodged a bullet!"

And what happens in such cases? That’s right – investors start buying again. A new wave of growth kicked off around mid-session and continued until the closing bell. All major U.S. indexes, except for old-timer Dow (DJIA-30), closed at their daily highs, gaining between 1% and 1.5%. (Dow Jones rose by +0.77%.)

The ITS index family kept pace with their U.S. counterparts, all gaining over 1% on the day. The ITS World Index (ITSW) hit an all-time high (ATH) for the fourth time this week, surpassing 1,300 points for the first time in its history and closing at 1,307. The most interesting part? A look at the main growth drivers shows just how diverse the ITSW portfolio is. The leaders included American and Chinese stocks from various sectors – technology (top performer: Israeli CyberArk Software (CYBR, +8.78%)), healthcare (top performer: Japan’s Takeda Pharmaceuticals (TAK, +2.71%)), and even commodities (top performer: UK-based Rio Tinto (RIO, +2.01%)).

Notably, for the second day in a row, one of Kazakhstan’s leading companies, Kaspi.kz (KSPI, +6.64%), ranked among the top gainers, with its market capitalisation increasing by over 15% in just two days.

Meanwhile, the ITS Shariah Index followed a more structured pattern. As expected, trillion-dollar big tech stocks led the way. At the forefront was Tesla (TSLA, +5.77%), followed by Nvidia (NVDA, +3.16%) and Apple (AAPL, +1.97%). The only non-tech company that managed to join their ranks was Cisco Systems (CSCO, +2.09%). Cisco shares surged as much as 6% early in the day following strong quarterly earnings but couldn’t hold onto those highs, ending with more modest gains.

Overall, the picture looks surprisingly optimistic. U.S. indexes and the ITS Shariah Index are within inches of their historical highs, while ITSW continues to break new records. Everything seems great – but there’s an uneasy feeling in the air. It’s starting to smell like a correction, and it might be time to prepare for it.