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Rising trade hopes boost Wall Street, send chip stocks soaring

Published 04/03/2019, 03:29 PM
Updated 04/03/2019, 03:29 PM
© Reuters. FILE PHOTO:  Traders work on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange shortly after the opening bell in New York

© Reuters. FILE PHOTO: Traders work on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange shortly after the opening bell in New York

By April Joyner

NEW YORK (Reuters) - U.S. stocks edged higher on Wednesday, extending a strong start to the quarter as rising hopes of a trade deal with Beijing boosted investor sentiment.

White House economic adviser Larry Kudlow said that talks between the United States and China have progressed and that both sides hope to get closer to a deal this week.

Shares of chipmakers, which are heavily reliant on China for their revenue, especially benefited. The Philadelphia Semiconductor index jumped as much as 3% to a record high. The index was last 2.4% higher.

Advanced Micro Devices (NASDAQ:AMD) Inc shares gained 9.3%, the most on the S&P 500, and Intel Corp (NASDAQ:INTC) shares rose 2.0% after Nomura Instinet started coverage of both the stocks with "buy" ratings.

The positive sentiment on trade outweighed underwhelming economic data.

The Institute for Supply Management came out with its U.S. services sector PMI for March, which was below estimates and at its lowest since August 2017.

Earlier, the ADP (NASDAQ:ADP) National Employment Report showed U.S. private employers added 129,000 jobs in March, below economists' estimates.

"It's the push-and-pull hope of a trade deal versus the stark reality of disappointing economic news," said Oliver Pursche, chief market strategist at Bruderman Asset Management in New York.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 13.37 points, or 0.05 percent, to 26,192.5, the S&P 500 gained 4.52 points, or 0.16 percent, to 2,871.76 and the Nasdaq Composite added 45.12 points, or 0.57 percent, to 7,893.80.

The gains put the S&P 500 index just 2% below a record high in September as a dovish Federal Reserve and trade hopes set the stage for a strong start to the quarter.

Boeing (NYSE:BA) Co capped gains on the Dow, dropping 1.3% after Baird said it expects Wall Street to cut earnings estimates "considerably" after the company reports delivery numbers next week. The numbers could reflect the 737-MAX groundings following the Ethiopian crash, Baird said.

Advancing issues outnumbered declining ones on the NYSE by a 1.64-to-1 ratio; on Nasdaq, a 1.52-to-1 ratio favored advancers.

© Reuters. FILE PHOTO:  Traders work on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange shortly after the opening bell in New York

The S&P 500 posted 57 new 52-week highs and three new lows; the Nasdaq Composite recorded 79 new highs and 28 new lows.

Latest comments

Another crash team headline, daily, trade hope push market higher, and people buy it
Manipulated market do not face the reality and factual economic data...
how come the jobs report does not affect the market.   The market seems to brush off bad factual news and only goes up with china trade deal rumours.  I do not understand
Bull market is the only explanation
election manuplation we will see second crush FLASH CRUSH the market prices
To sum it up for you....Federal Reserve Prints more monies....watch BND and UUP in correlation with movement.
Bubble will break soon the king is naked...
like gum bubble
after blowup it will stick everywhere
And the jobs report? Oh nevermind
Lol, bad news is good news? Lol
With unemployment having been so low, it makes sense that the rate of job growth couldn't be sustained...perhaps the market has priced that in a bit.
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