Market News

Eight of the 10 major cities with the biggest drop in office occupancy during the pandemic had an average one-way commute of more than 30 minutes. Meanwhile, six of the 10 cities with the smallest drop in office occupancy have average commutes of less than 30 minutes.

Some resort owners are converting room nights for sale into nonfungible tokens, or NFTs, that can be bought or sold by hotel guests, similar to the StubHub market for concert and sporting event tickets.

The annual volume of rental-apartment purchases almost doubled between 2019 and 2021. In the first quarter of 2022, investors spent $63 billion on apartment buildings, the highest figure on record.

Originations at the 50 largest lenders fell 41% in the first quarter from a year earlier, with total mortgage volume expected to fall 37% for all of 2022.

The stocks in the Russell 1000 with the highest dividend yields on Nov. 19, 2021, rose an average of 4% over the following six months. Shares of Russell 1000 companies without dividends fell an average of 29% over that time.

Scarce inventory and mortgage rates topping 5% have combined with steep prices to yank sales activity back to where it was before the boom. April’s seasonally adjusted annual rate of 5.61 million was the lowest rate since June 2020.

For April, U.S. hotel average daily rate was up 35% compared to April 2020, marking 12 consecutive months of double-digit, year-over-year improvement in the metric.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average closed Wednesday down 1164.52 points, or 3.6%, and the S&P 500 dropped 4%, or 165.17 points. The Dow and S&P recorded their worst percentage declines since June 11, 2020.

An exchange-traded fund tracking companies that have merged with SPACs is down about 30% for the year, a much sharper drop than the broader market.

The Securities and Exchange Commission estimates the plan will raise the cost to businesses to comply with its disclosure rules from $3.9 billion to $10.2 billion. The leap in expense equates to an ongoing additional cost of $420,000 a year on average for a publicly listed small company and $530,000 a year for a bigger firm, the SEC said.