Further gains in U.S. stocks on Friday ushered in a week of new records, milestones and victories for Wall Street.
The S&P 500 rose 0.6%, closing above the 5,000 mark for the first time. This marks the 10th time in less than a month for the index, completing its 14th winning week out of the past 15 and continuing a wild rally that began around Halloween.
The Nasdaq Composite Index rose 1.2%, coming within 0.4% of its own all-time high set in 2021. The Dow Jones Industrial Average lagged a day after setting its own latest record. It fell 54 points (0.1%).
For a market that is supposed to move based on hard numbers like interest rates, profits, and revenues, milestones like the S&P 500 index at 5,000 are not that important. However, they can stimulate the animal spirit of the market, which is also prone to emotional movements.
The Wall Street rally began with hopes that once inflation subsided, the Federal Reserve would ease the pressure by cutting interest rates. These cuts appear to be slower than expected, as the economy continues to be reported to be significantly stronger these days. However, this strength has raised expectations for corporate profits and supported stock prices.
Cloudflare became the latest company to soar, reporting strong profits in its latest quarter that beat analysts' expectations. The cloud services company soared 19.5% after announcing it signed both its largest new customer and largest contract renewal ever, despite the overall economic environment “remaining difficult to predict.”
Big tech stocks have been doing most of the market's heavy lifting for more than a year, thanks in part to mania around artificial intelligence technology. Nvidia, Microsoft and Amazon each rose at least 1.6%, making them the three biggest forces pushing the S&P 500 higher.
That helped offset a 3.6% decline at PepsiCo, which reported earnings for the latest quarter that fell short of analysts' expectations. The company said growth has slowed as customers return to pre-pandemic snacking and other behaviors.
Expedia also fell 17.8% despite reporting better-than-expected profits. The company provided its outlook for the first three months of 2024, with analysts pointing to a slowdown in booking growth. The company also announced that new CEO Arian Gorin will take over in May.
Take-Two Interactive, the publisher of “Grand Theft Auto” and other video games, reported lower-than-expected profits and fell 8.7%. The company also revised downward its earnings forecast for the fiscal year ending at the end of March.
Overall, the S&P 500 rose 28.70 points to 5,026.61. The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 54.64 points to $38,671.69, and the Nasdaq rose $196.95 to $15,990.66.
The profits of major S&P 500 companies have generally exceeded expectations for this fiscal year, with about two-thirds of the earnings completed. That's usually the case, but this time even more companies are doing so than in previous years, according to FactSet.
That helped fuel optimism on Wall Street, but contrarians say it may have gone too far and pushed stocks to very expensive levels.
Traders are flowing into some riskier investments at a sufficient pace that the contrarian strategy maintained by Bank of America, which currently leans more towards selling than buying, remains convincing. Not at a certain level. This indicator tracks the level of fear and greed in the market, and suggests buying in October when fear reaches convincing highs.
In the bond market, US bond yields rose little by little. The yield on the 10-year U.S. Treasury rose to 4.16% from 4.15% late Thursday.
But the move was much quieter than earlier in the month, when the 10-year Treasury yield soared from 3.85% as traders pushed ahead with expectations for a rate cut.
This means that when expectations of an impending rate cut fade, the stock market may continue to make new highs, especially after previous markets appeared to be moving solely on such expectations. That's a reassuring signal.
Mark Hackett, head of investment research at Nationwide, said: “While calmer market sentiment is a positive sign, investors must fight against complacency, which is a natural reaction to such a strong and steady bull market. ” he said.
In overseas stock markets, most indexes fell slightly. In Asia, several markets were closed for the Lunar New Year holiday.
Tokyo's Nikkei stock average rose 0.1% after hitting a 34-year high earlier in the day.
