Pre-Markets in Green to Close a Volatile November

After skipping Thursday trading in observance of the Thanksgiving holiday (burp!) we embark on a half-day of trading this Friday, with the markets closing at 1pm ET today. Early this pre-market period, a power outage at The CME Group CME caused a stoppage of early-morning trading that is finally coming back online fully at this hour.

Market indexes are up rather modestly as investors shake off that temporary shutdown. Currently, the Dow is up +52 points, +0.11%, while the S&P 500 is +7, +0.10%, and the tech-heavy Nasdaq +45 points, +0.18%. This looks like the first down-trading month for the Nasdaq since March of this year, with the Dow -0.74%, the S&P 500-1.31%, the Nasdaq -3.12% and the small-cap Russell 2000 -0.87% month to date.

Black Friday Is Here! Still a Big Deal?

Today’s the day after Thanksgiving, so it’s officially Black Friday — the day retailers traditionally are able to switch from red ink in their year-to-date ledgers to black ink. Gone are the days of 500 hungry deal-hunters waiting for the locked door to open as the sun comes up, but holiday shopping is always a noteworthy topic for retailers.

The National Retail Federation expects no less than $1 TRILLION in revenues spent between November and December, which would be a record high shopping season. Adobe ADBE anticipates Black Friday retail numbers to grow +8.3% from last year. It was also reported a record $6.4 billion was spent on Thanksgiving spending this year, demonstrating the American consumer is alive and well.

However, in a survey from Deloitte taken back in October, holiday shopping from Black Friday through Cyber Monday is expected to average $622 per person, a -4.3% drop from last year. That said, 82% of the 1200 consumers surveyed expected to do some shopping this weekend, up from 79% in 2024.

Sandwiched in between these two bookends of inaugural holiday shopping this year is Small Business Saturday. Here we have some more anecdotal data: Small Business Confidence has come down steadily over the past three months, whether from tariffs increasing costs or immigration crackdowns keeping lower-pay employees from working small business jobs. 

Generally speaking, higher-income people are less affected by higher prices, whether we’re talking about holiday shopping or something else. Lower-income Americans are expected to tighten their belts on spending this year. However, going back to the Deloitte report, both lower-wage earners (sub-$50K per year) and higher-wage earners (above $200K per year) are looking to spend less this holiday season. Only those between $100-199K are expected to ramp up spending this year.

Finally, “buy now/pay later” options look to be gaining traction this year, which would put payment plans in place for certain bigger-ticket items. Companies such as Affirm AFRM would stand to benefit from this trend, and shares are up +1.37% so far this hour, +13% year to date. The company beat earnings estimates last quarter by more than +100%.

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This article originally published on Zacks Investment Research (zacks.com).

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