What the numbers mean

The S&P 500 and the Dow

Both are baskets of large American companies. The S&P 500 tracks five hundred of them and is the better read on the market as a whole; the Dow tracks thirty and moves more on the fortunes of individual names. When you hear "the market was up", it usually means the S&P.

For a business owner a single day’s move matters less than the direction over months. It is a rough gauge of whether customers feel wealthy.

The 30-year fixed mortgage rate

The single most useful number to watch if you touch property. It sets what a buyer can afford, and therefore what a deal is worth. A rate moving a point changes a monthly payment by hundreds of dollars, which changes what people will pay for a house.

It follows the 10-year Treasury yield rather than the Federal Reserve's headline rate, which is why it sometimes moves in a direction the news does not seem to explain.

Gold and silver

Quoted at spot, meaning the price for immediate delivery of one ounce. Gold tends to rise when people are nervous about currencies or inflation. Silver moves with the same mood but also with industrial demand, so it swings harder in both directions.

Bitcoin, Ethereum, Solana and XRP

Four of the most commonly held cryptocurrencies. We show the price and the change over five days. Unlike the stock market, they trade continuously, which is why the number can be different before Shachris and after Maariv.

Dollars and shekels

The rate never sits still, so a price agreed in one currency is not the same price a week later. Type an amount and it converts at the live rate.

Reading a percentage

The figure beside each price is the change over the last five days (for the coins, sometimes the last 24 hours). Green is up, red is down. A one percent move on a major index is a notable week; a one percent move on crypto is an ordinary hour.