(June 13): The S&P 500 and Nasdaq edged higher on Thursday as Oracle’s results boosted optimism around artificial intelligence (AI), offsetting concerns around rising tensions in the Middle East and a drop in Boeing shares.
Oracle shares shot up nearly 14% to record highs after the cloud service provider raised its annual revenue growth forecast, driven by strong demand for its AI-related cloud services.
Boeing declined 5% after an Air India 787-8 Dreamliner jet crashed minutes after taking off in India’s western city of Ahmedabad, killing more than 200 people.
“I think it will be important to see whether the findings point to a problem with maintenance rather than a problem with the original equipment,” said Sam Stovall, chief investment strategist at CFRA Research.
Signs of rising tensions in the Middle East also weighed on global markets.
President Donald Trump said on Wednesday US personnel were being moved out of the region as it could be a “dangerous place” and the US would not allow Iran to have a nuclear weapon. Officials from both countries are scheduled to meet in Oman on Sunday for a sixth round of nuclear talks.
A senior Iranian official said on Wednesday Tehran will strike US bases in the region if nuclear negotiations fail and conflict arises.
At 11.40am ET, the Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 49.67 points, or 0.12%, to 42,816.1, the S&P 500 gained 8.65 points, or 0.14%, to 6,030.89 and the Nasdaq Composite gained 18.95 points, or 0.1%, to 19,634.83.
Seven of the 11 major S&P 500 sub-sectors rose, led by information technology stocks with a 0.8% rise.
Shares of Nvidia, Broadcom and Super Micro Computers rose more than 1% each.
US-listed shares of gold miners also advanced, as bullion prices hit a one-week high. Newmont gained 3.5%, Harmony Gold was up 3.7% and AngloGold Ashanti rose 5.6%.
Softer-than-expected producer price dataand initial jobless claims numbers pointing to a potential weakening in the labour market helped reduce investor jitters around tariff-driven price pressures and boosted rate cut bets.
Traders are pricing in 53.7 basis points (bps) of rate cuts by year-end, per data compiled by LSEG. They are penciling in a near 60% chance of a 25bps cut in September, according to the CME Group’s FedWatch tool.
Policymakers are widely expected to keep rates unchanged next week.
With investors increasingly expecting Trump to reach favourable trade agreements with several countries in the coming weeks, the benchmark S&P 500 index is about 2% below its record high touched in February.
The tech-heavy Nasdaq is about 2.7% from record levels hit in December.
Goldman Sachs trimmed its US recession probability to 30% from 35% on easing uncertainty around Trump’s tariff policies.
Advancing issues outnumbered decliners by a 1.01-to-1 ratio on the NYSE. On the Nasdaq, declining issues outnumbered advancers by a 1.5-to-1 ratio.
The S&P 500 posted eight new 52-week highs and three new lows while the Nasdaq Composite recorded 38 new highs and 48 new lows.
Uploaded by Felyx Teoh
