U.S. stocks start September off with more gains, led by tech
Wall Street kicked off September with another set of milestones Tuesday, as an afternoon rally carried the S&P 500 and Nasdaq composite to all-time highs.
Wall Street kicked off September with another set of milestones Tuesday, as an afternoon rally carried the S&P 500 and Nasdaq composite to all-time highs.
The Dow Jones industrial average clawed its way back to a tiny gain for the year, the first time the Dow has been up for 2020 since late February.
The Dow Jones industrial average, which tracks 30 large, publicly traded companies, is replacing three of the stocks.
The S&P 500 rallied 34.12, or 1%, to 3,431.28 and added to the all-time high it set last week, when it erased the last of its losses from the coronavirus pandemic.
An amazing, monthslong rally has put the S&P 500 back to where it was before the pandemic, even though millions of workers are still unemployed and businesses continue to close across the country.
For a third time in the past week, the S&P 500 popped above the closing record during the session, but ended below the Feb. 19 record close of 3,386.15.
The S&P 500 index climbed as high as 1.6% on Wednesday, topping the level reached on Feb. 19, before fading a bit before the market’s close.
Gains for tech stocks, particularly Microsoft and Apple, pushed the Nasdaq composite up 1.5%, to another record.
The stock market was dragged down by a report showing layoffs are picking up across the country along with coronavirus counts.
The rally, which gained strength in the final hour of trading, nudged the benchmark S&P 500 index to a slight gain for the year and drove the Nasdaq composite to an all-time high.
The market’s latest moves came as earnings reporting season kicked off. Like the broader market, financial stocks drifted between gains and losses for much of the day before turning higher in the afternoon.
The S&P 500 index posted its fifth straight increase, its longest winning streak since December, as Amazon.com Inc. shares rose past $3,000 for the first time.
The whiplash that ripped through markets in the second quarter came as investors became increasingly hopeful that the economy can pull out of its severe, sudden recession relatively quickly.
U.S. companies are providing reason for hope that an earnings recession may be less severe than some analysts expect.
Stocks closed sharply lower on Wall Street on Friday as the number of confirmed new coronavirus cases in the United States hit an all-time high, stoking worries that the reopening of businesses investors have been banking on to revive the economy will be derailed.
Financial companies led stocks broadly higher on Wall Street on Thursday as traders welcomed news that the Federal Reserve and other regulators are removing some limits on the ability of banks to make investments.
U.S. stocks rose for a second day, but faded near the closing of the market as concern mounted that a spike in virus cases in some states could curtail economic activity.
U.S. futures swung wildly as the remarks caused concern that the deal signed in January, which paused the trade war between world’s two largest economies, was in jeopardy.
Because conventional economic reports on hiring, consumer confidence and spending can lag a month or more, investment strategists are looking at other indicators.
Markets have been trending upward this week, but rising levels of coronavirus infections in several hotspots around the world are raising concerns that all the improvements could get upended.