Wall Street rises as Big Tech charges higher

NEW YORK, April 26 — Wall Street’s main indexes advanced today as most megacap growth stocks rose after robust quarterly results from Alphabet pushed its market value over US$2 trillion (RM9.5 trillion), while an in-line inflation reading calmed interest rate jitters.

Alphabet jumped 10.8 per cent to a record high after the Google-parent announced its first-ever dividend, a US$70 billion stock buyback and beat estimates for first-quarter results.

The share surge led to the search giant’s market value briefly topping US$2 trillion on an intraday basis.

Lifting sentiment further, Microsoft gained 2 per cent on beating Wall Street estimates for third-quarter revenue and profit, driven by gains from AI adoption across its cloud services.

Other growth stocks also rose on the results, with Amazon.com and Nvidia up 1.7 per cent and 1.6 per cent, respectively.

Aiding further gains, the personal consumption expenditures (PCE) price index rose 0.3 per cent in March, in line with estimates by economists polled by Reuters. In the 12 months through March, PCE inflation advanced 2.7 per cent against expectations of 2.6 per cent.

Excluding the volatile food and energy components, the PCE price index increased 0.3 per cent last month against expectations of a 0.3 per cent increase. Annually, it came in at 2.8 per cent versus forecasts of 2.7 per cent.

“This is a good number in (the sense) that it doesn’t hurt the confidence of the Fed that inflation’s moving in the right direction, but it doesn’t necessarily add to their confidence (that) it’s going towards their 2 per cent target on a sustainable basis,” said Steve Wyett, chief investment strategist at BOK Financial.

Money markets priced in a firmer chance of a rate cut in September after the data.

Yield on the benchmark 10-year Treasury note fell after the data, last standing at 4.6506 per cent

The upbeat earnings across several sectors this week have propped up Wall Street’s main stock indexes for weekly gains, with the benchmark S&P 500 looking to snap three weeks of losses while the Nasdaq is set to end four straight weeks of declines.

Adjusted blended earnings for the first quarter are estimated to grow by 8.7 per cent on a year-on-year basis versus 7.4 per cent growth seen on Thursday, according to LSEG data.

At 9.43am ET, the Dow Jones Industrial Average was up 94.39 points, or 0.25 per cent, at 38,180.19, the S&P 500 was up 36.08 points, or 0.71 per cent, at 5,084.50, and the Nasdaq Composite was up 207.74 points, or 1.33 per cent, at 15,819.50.

Seven of the 11 major S&P 500 sectors were trading higher, with communication services jumping 4.6 per cent, while energy led losses with a 1.1 per cent fall.

Snap surged 24.4 per cent after the social media firm beat first-quarter estimates for quarterly revenue and user growth. Shares of Pinterest also rose 4.1 per cent.

Exxon Mobil lost 2.8 per cent after the largest US oil company missed analysts’ estimates with a 28 per cent year-on-year drop in first-quarter profit.

Intel dropped 12.3 per cent on forecasting second-quarter revenue and profit below estimates as it faces weak demand for its traditional data center and PC chips and trails in the surging market for AI components.

Advancing issues outnumbered decliners by a 3.01-to-1 ratio on the NYSE and by a 2.14-to-1 ratio on the Nasdaq.

The S&P index recorded seven new 52-week highs and eight new lows, while the Nasdaq recorded 18 new highs and 30 new lows. — Reuters