Investing.com – Wall Street traded higher on Thursday with sentiment boosted by earnings from department stores Macy’s and Kohl’s ahead of Friday’s July retail sales data, while oil staged a $2 dollar turnaround on the back of Cushing inventory data.
At 15:25GMT or 11:25AM ET, the Dow 30 gained 114 points, or 0.62%, the S&P 500 rose 10 points, or 0.44%, while the tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite traded up 17 points or 0.32%.
Oil prices went on a wild ride Thursday, falling more than 1% to intraday lows after the International Energy Agency on Thursday slashed its forecast for global oil demand growth next year amid a dimmer economic outlook and warned that the "massive" stock overhang is keeping a lid on crude oil prices.
However, crude staged a turnaround to jump more than 3% after Genscape data showed that crude stockpiles at the Cushing oil hub fell 389,906 barrels from the week ending August 5 to the one finishing August 9.
U.S. crude futures traded up 3.69% to $43.25 by 15:26GMT, or 11:26AM ET, while Brent oil gained 0.81% to $45.73.
Macy’s (NYSE:M) and Kohl’s (NYSE:KSS) better-than-expected second quarter earnings send their shares up more than 10% on Thursday, providing bullish sentiment for rivals such as JC Penney Company Inc Holding (NYSE:JCP) or Sears Holdings Corporation (NASDAQ:SHLD).
Nordstrom (NYSE:JWN) also pocketed gains ahead of releasing its own earnings after the close.
Chinese online retailing giant Alibaba (NYSE:BABA) jumped 5% after revenue soared 59%, beating analyst expectations.
Outside earnings, Valeant Pharmaceuticals (NYSE:VRX) plunged more than 9% as U.S. prosecutors opened a criminal investigation into the Canadian drugmaker over whether it hid from insurers its relationship with a specialty pharmacy that helped boost its drug sales, the Wall Street Journal reported on Wednesday.
On the economic front, weekly jobless claims fell less than expected, but continued to show a firming labor market.
Import prices managed to edge forward in July despite expectations for a decline while export prices also rose slightly more than expected.