The Nasdaq closed at a record high for the first time in over two years as Wall Street recovered from the previous day’s decline caused by worries before the U.S. PCE price index release
The S&P 500 and Nasdaq reached record highs, and the global equity index moved up on Thursday following the U.S. inflation announcement, which did not surprise investors.
The Nasdaq closed at a record high for the first time in over two years as Wall Street recovered from the previous day’s decline caused by worries before the U.S. personal consumer expenditures (PCE) price index release.
Despite concerns, the PCE data, the Federal Reserve’s preferred inflation measure, revealed the smallest annual uptick in inflation in almost three years, maintaining the chance of a Fed interest rate cut in June.
Today’s market movements really reflect a relief that we aren’t seeing a re-acceleration in inflation. That’s impacted fixed income markets as well as equity markets, said Sid Vaidya, U.S. wealth strategist at TD Wealth.
Investors were on edge before the PCE data due to higher-than-expected recent consumer price index (CPI) and producer price index (PPI) figures.
Markets are actually heaving a bit of a sigh of relief that we didn’t get the same type of upside surprises we saw in the earlier inflation readings, said Mona Mahajan, senior investment strategist at Edward Jones in New York.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average increased by 47.37 points, or 0.12%, to 38,996.39, while the S&P 500 rose by 26.51 points, or 0.52%, reaching a new closing peak of 5,096.27. The Nasdaq Composite climbed by 144.18 points, or 0.90%, ending at a high of 16,091.92, surpassing its previous record of 16,057.44 set in November 2021.
In the month, the S&P rose by 5.17%, the Nasdaq gained 6.12%, and the Dow increased by 2.22%, all marking their fourth consecutive monthly gains. This streak of monthly gains was the longest for the S&P since the five months ending in July 2023.
MSCI’s global stock gauge also aimed for a record close, rising by 2.73 points, or 0.36%, to 760.86.
The STOXX 600 index remained unchanged, while the German DAX surged by 0.4% to a new all-time high after data revealed that lower energy costs slowed inflation to 2.7% in February.
