Investing.com – Wall Street traded mostly higher on Tuesday, breaking what was the Dow’s the longest losing streak since 2011, as consumer confidence data allowed stocks to turn back from early losses, while investors looked ahead to a string of appearances from Federal Reserve (Fed) officials and weekly crude inventory data.
At 11:37AM ET (16:37GMT), the Dow Jones gained 76 points, or 0.37%, the S&P 500 rose 9 points, or 0.37%, while the Nasdaq Composite traded up 11 points, or 0.18%.
After opening in negative territory, U.S. equities managed to turn around after consumer confidence hit a 16-year high.
In a report, the Conference Board, a market research group, said its index of consumer confidence jumped to 125.6 this month from a reading of 116.1 (revised from an initial 114.8) in February. That was its highest level since December 2000.
In other positive news for the housing market, U.S. home prices rose 5.9% to a 31-month high in January, according to the S&P/Case-Shiller U.S. home price index.
Markets still looked ahead Tuesday to comments from a number of Fed policymakers later in the day for more clues on the timing of the next U.S. rate hike.
The focus will undoubtedly be on Fed chair Janet Yellen who was set to speak on workforce development challenges in low-income communities at 12:50PM ET (16:50GMT) on the off chance that she provides any indications for the future path of monetary policy.
Dallas Fed chief Rob Kaplan was scheduled for an appearance as well, though it would be unlikely for him to add anything new to comments made after Tuesday’s close that U.S. GDP growth should be enough to remove slack from the labor market, that the U.S. central bank was meeting its dual mandate and that continued progress towards goal will mean that he remains supportive of further rate hikes.
Kansas City Fed president Esther George and Fed governor Jerome Powell are also on tap Tuesday.
Fed fund futures priced in around a 46% chance of a rate hike in June, according to Investing.com’s Fed Rate Monitor Tool. Odds of an increase in July just topped the 50% threshold and moved to about 68% for September.
On the earnings front, Darden Restaurants (NYSE:DRI) led advancers on the S&P 500 with gains of around 8% after the restaurant chain beat on both the top and bottom line and raised its 2017 earnings guidance to $3.95-$4.00 per share.
Red Hat Inc (NYSE:RHT) was the second largest gainer on the index, rising nearly 6% after producing its own quarterly earnings and forecasting earnings-per-share of $2.60-$2.64, above the $2.59 consensus estimate.
In other headlines, Ford Motor (NYSE:F) jumped more than 2% on Tuesday after announcing it would invest $1.2 billion in three Michigan facilities and create 130 jobs in projects largely in line with a previous agreement with the United Auto Workers union, hours after U.S. President Donald Trump touted a "major investment" by the automaker on Twitter.
Snap (NYSE:SNAP) tumbled more than 4% on Tuesday after Facebook (NASDAQ:FB) said it’s giving the camera a central place on its smartphone app for the first time, encouraging users to take more pictures and edit them with digital stickers that show the influence of rival Snapchat.
In M&A, Tesla (NASDAQ:TSLA) gained nearly 3% after it announced that Chinese tech giant Tencent Holdings had taken a 5% stake in the electric automaker.
Amazon.com (NASDAQ:AMZN) agreed to buy Middle East online retailer Souq.com to expand its product offerings in the Arab world.
Meanwhile, oil prices pushed higher during North American morning hours on Tuesday, bouncing back from the prior session's losses amid optimism that an OPEC-led production cut will be extended through the end of the year and buoyed by news that Libya's oil output had fallen by roughly a third, or 252,000 barrels per day (bpd), because armed factions blocked production at the Sharara and Wafa oil fields.
U.S. crude futures gained 1.84% to $48.61 by 11:41AM ET (16:41GMT), while Brent oil traded up 1.73% to $51.78.
That was ahead of the American Petroleum Institute’s weekly report on crude inventories out at 4:30PM ET (20:30GMT).