Thursday’s trading in the US stock indices ended with a sharp decline. Investors continued to evaluate forecasts for inflation and economic growth in anticipation of Friday’s statistical data on the dynamics of consumer prices in the United States.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 1.94% to 32272.79 points. Standard & Poor’s 500 fell by 2.38% – to 4017.82 points. The Nasdaq Composite index collapsed 2.75% to 11754.23 points.

Devon Energy Corp. shares lost 0.1%. The U.S. oil and gas company agreed to acquire the leases and several assets of RimRock Oil and Gas in the Williston Basin for $865 million.

Signet Jewelers’ stock price rose 9.1%. The company, which owns one of the largest chains of jewelry stores in the U.S., Canada and the UK, posted a quarterly loss, but increased revenue and raised the volume of its share buyback program, which triggered an active growth of its quotations.

Target Corp. shares fell 1.4%. The company, which owns the second-largest discount store chain in the U.S., increased its quarterly dividend by 20% to $1.08 per share from $0.9 per share in the previous quarter.

Five Below Inc. shares fell 1.4%. The U.S. discount store chain saw its net income fall by more than a third in Q1 FY 2022, with revenue coming in worse than forecast.

Intel Corp. shares fell 3%. The company will suspend new hiring at its PC chip unit and change its near-term capital spending plan amid heightened economic uncertainty.

High inflation may increase expectations that the U.S. Federal Reserve (Fed) will continue its cycle of aggressive rate hikes in the second half of this year, despite signs of slowing economic growth, Trading Economics said.

The European Central Bank (ECB) yesterday expectedly kept the benchmark interest rate on loans at zero and the deposit rate at minus 0.5%. The marginal lending rate was left at 0.25%.

Traders were also evaluating a new batch of US labor market statistics yesterday.

The number of Americans who applied for unemployment benefits for the first time last week jumped by 27 thousand – up to 229 thousand people, according to the report of the U.S. Department of Labor. According to the revised data, a week earlier the number of applications amounted to 202 thousand, not 200 thousand, as previously reported.

Analysts on average expected the figure to increase to 206 thousand compared to the previously announced level of the previous week, according to the results of Bloomberg survey.\