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US Stocks Rise Near Record High 07/15 15:22
U.S. stocks ticked higher Wednesday following strong profit reports from
BlackRock and other big companies. The tentative gains came as oil prices swung
to their highest levels in a month because of the war with Iran.
NEW YORK (AP) -- U.S. stocks ticked higher Wednesday following strong profit
reports from BlackRock and other big companies. The tentative gains came as oil
prices swung to their highest levels in a month because of the war with Iran.
The S&P 500 rose 0.4% after flipping between modest gains and losses through
the day, and it's back within 0.5% of its all-time high set last month. The Dow
Jones Industrial Average added 150 points, or 0.3%, and the Nasdaq composite
climbed 0.6%.
BlackRock helped lead the market with a rise of 6.6% after the company
behind some of the most popular investment funds reported stronger profit and
revenue for the latest quarter than analysts expected. CEO Laurence Fink said
its iShares funds topped $6 trillion in assets under management during the
quarter, roughly doubling in three years.
Bank of New York Mellon rose 5.1% after adding to the spate of strong
earnings reports from many of the biggest U.S. banks a day earlier. Cintas
climbed 4.4% after the provider of office uniforms, restroom supplies and other
products likewise delivered a better profit for the latest quarter than
analysts forecast.
They helped offset a drop for Elevance Health, which fell 8.5% even though
it reported stronger profit and revenue than analysts expected.
Expectations are high for U.S. companies' profit growth during the spring.
They'll need to beat them to justify the big moves their stock prices have
made, with indexes near their records.
All told, the S&P 500 rose 28.81 points to 7,572.40 and is within 0.5% of
its record set early last month. The Dow Jones Industrial Average added 150.37
to 52,658.64, and the Nasdaq composite climbed 162.22 to 26,269.23.
The broad U.S. stock market got a lift from another report showing inflation
slowed last month. It said inflation at the wholesale level slowed to 5.5% from
6% in May, and it was much better than the acceleration that economists
expected.
The day before, a separate report said inflation that U.S. consumers are
feeling was also not as bad as economists expected last month.
Such numbers take pressure off the Federal Reserve, which is considering
raising interest rates. Higher rates would keep a lid on inflation, but they
also slow the economy and hurt prices for all kinds of investments.
Following the inflation report, traders see just a 10% chance that the Fed
will raise its main interest rate at its next meeting in a couple weeks. That's
down from the nearly 42% probability they saw on Monday, before the inflation
reports, according to data from CME Group.
Also helping to pull down expectations was a speech from John Williams,
president of the New York Fed. He said that "there are encouraging reasons to
expect that inflation has peaked and should edge down in coming quarters."
Fed Chair Kevin Warsh, meanwhile, gave few clues on what to expect in
testimony before a Senate committee. "Any central banker would be happy to have
data going in the right direction," he said about this week's encouraging
inflation reports, but "these are all imperfect measures of the state of
underlying inflation."
The yield on the 10-year Treasury fell to 4.55% from 4.58% late Tuesday and
from 4.62% the day before.
Upward pressure on inflation remains because of the war with Iran, which has
seen days of back-and-forth strikes by the United States and Iran across the
Middle East.
The price for a barrel of Brent crude briefly topped $86 in the morning
before falling back to settle at $84.95 per barrel, up 0.3% from the day before.
In stock markets abroad, South Korea's Kospi index jumped 6.2%.
Seoul's market is dominated by two huge tech companies, Samsung Electronics
and SK Hynix, and its main index has already had drops of 8.9%, 7.9% and 5.3%
so far this month because of sharp swings for stocks caught up in the
artificial-intelligence boom.
In Amsterdam, ASML reported stronger revenue growth for the latest quarter
than it had forecast. CEO Christophe Fouquet said continuing progress in AI has
customers accelerating their expansions, and the maker of chipmaking machinery
gave a forecast for upcoming revenue growth that topped analysts' expectations.
ASML's stock in Amsterdam slipped 0.4%, but its stock that trades in the
United States rose 2.2%.
Its strong forecast helped calm some of the worries that have sent
AI-related stocks spinning recently. Chief among them is the possibility that
their prices shot too high in the euphoria around AI.
In China, stocks rose 1.4% in Hong Kong but fell 0.3% in Shanghai after the
government said the world's second-largest economy expanded at a 4.3%
annualized pace last quarter, down from the 5% growth rate at the start of the
year.
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