Trading results for 19 May 2025
Monday began on a negative note following Moody’s decision to downgrade the U.S. sovereign credit rating. Unsurprisingly, this unsettled market participants: the first half of the day saw active sell-offs, with futures on all major U.S. indexes losing up to 1.5% at one point.
The main trading session opened in a similarly pessimistic mood. It seemed that the mini rally observed last week had come to an end. However, the bulls remained optimistic and gradually pulled the indexes upwards throughout the day. By the closing bell, the markets had moved into positive territory. While the gains were largely symbolic, even a modest rise in the green looks far better than a close in the red.
The Dow Jones (DJIA-30) performed best, closing up 0.32% thanks to strong growth in leading pharmaceutical stocks. Its younger peers, the S&P 500 and NASDAQ Composite, posted more modest gains of 0.09% and 0.02% respectively. Nevertheless, this marked the sixth consecutive positive session for the S&P 500 – a modest but welcome achievement.
The ITS family of indexes performed slightly better. Both the global companies index ITS World (ITSW) and the Islamic equities index ITS Shariah (ITSS) posted solid gains of nearly 1% (+0.91% and +0.98% respectively). Interestingly, growth in each index was driven by completely different companies.
The one unifying factor was the strong performance of healthcare stocks. In the ITSW index, insurance giant UnitedHealth (UNH) led the way, finally reversing a month-long decline and gaining more than 8% (+8.21%) on the day. In the ITSS index, the top performer was pharmaceutical giant Merck & Co. (MRK), whose shares rose by 1.54%.
The ITSW index once again demonstrated the advantages of sound geographical diversification. By Monday’s close, only two U.S. issuers – UnitedHealth and Microsoft (MSFT, +1.01%) – featured in the top 10. In second place, just behind the leader, were shares of Kazakhstan’s tech flagship Kaspi.kz (KSPI), which climbed more than 2.5% (+2.51%). Also included in the top ten were shares of several European and Asian companies, such as British American Tobacco Plc ADR (BTI, +2.20%) and UBS Group AG (UBS, +2.15%).
As for the ITSS index, its top 10 was evenly split between American healthcare and technology stocks, with four representatives from each sector. However, no explosive growth was observed – most stocks rose by less than 1%.
Overall, despite the near-zero movement in the U.S. indexes, Monday can be considered a positive day. Investors showed resilience and were clearly in no rush to lock in profits. The market remains stable – and this gives us every reason to expect the upward trend to continue.