Investing.com - Wall Street opened higher on Wednesday as strong earnings from Goldman Sachs and Bank of America helped lift investor sentiment.
The S&P 500 rose 5 points, or 0.21%, as of 9:33 AM ET (14:33 GMT), while the Dow increased 80 points, or 0.34%, and the tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite gained 20 points, or 0.29%.
Strong earnings from banks have helped set aside worry over slowing global growth and trade war concerns. Goldman Sachs (NYSE:GS) jumped 4% after it reported a rise in trading revenue, while Bank of America (NYSE:BAC) rose 5.5% after its profit beat estimates.
One of the biggest deals ever in the fintech sector also improved the mood. U.S. financial technology provider Fiserv (NASDAQ:FISV) will buy payment processor First Data (NYSE:FDC) for $22 billion.
"Corporations saying that they are going to spend money to acquire other companies to continue growing shows that 'animal sprit' is still alive," said Michael Antonelli, managing director, institutional sales trading at Robert W. Baird.
"This counters the recession argument and that makes you think that the market has over-discounted the slowing that's going on in the world."
Technology stocks were higher after the news, with Apple (NASDAQ:AAPL) up 1.1% and Netflix (NASDAQ:NFLX) gaining 0.75%, while Amazon.com (NASDAQ:AMZN) rose 1.4% and Tesla (NASDAQ:TSLA) climbed 1.4%.
Elsewhere, Snap (NYSE:SNAP) fell 10% after news that its chief financial officer is resigning just one year after on the job.
In commodities, gold futures rose 0.25% to $1,291.55 a troy ounce and crude oil decreased 0.23% to $51.99 a barrel. The U.S. dollar index, which measures the greenback against a basket of six major currencies, was down 0.03% to 95.64.
-- Reuters contributed to this report.