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By 15:20 ET (20:20 GMT), the Dow Jones Industrial Average was up 331 points, or 0.9%, the S&P 500 traded 1.1% higher and Nasdaq Composite climbed 1.3%.
Tech stocks rebounded to lead a sea of green across stocks as investors appeared to pile into stocks that were beaten down a day earlier after the Fed shot down hopes of a March cut.
The rally in tech just ahead of the sector’s mega-cap stocks set to report Thursday, with Amazon (NASDAQ:AMZN), Apple (NASDAQ:AAPL) and Facebook-owner Meta Platforms (NASDAQ:META) earnings due the closing bell.
Semiconductor stocks were slightly higher as a 4% slip in Qualcomm (NASDAQ:QCOM) kept a lid on gains in the sector, though investor concerns about maturing 5G smartphone market and loss of market share weighed on stock.
“[T]he success that it had in the first few years of 5G creates a tough bar for further growth,” Morgan Stanley said in a note.
Peloton sinks as guidance triggers bearish bets; Merck impresses on earnings stage
Peloton Interactive (NASDAQ:PTON) stock slumped 23% after the fitness company offered a weak outlook for revenue and free cash flow, while Royal
Royal Caribbean Cruises (NYSE:RCL) gave up early gains even as the cruise operator reported quarterly results and guidance that topped Wall Street estimates amid robust demand for cruise vacations.
Merck (NYSE:MRK) stock rose over 4% after the drugmaker posted better-than-expected fourth-quarter results on strong sales of its cancer immunotherapy Keytruda, now the world’s biggest selling prescription medicine.
Initial jobless claims rose to 224,000 in the week ended Jan. 27, up from an upwardly revised 215,000 and the highest level since Mid-November.
“We expect that more strain is going to become evident, especially as middle class household deal with slowing wage gains and inflation fatigue,” Jefferies said in a note.
The rise in jobless claims comes just a day ahead of the monthly non-farm payrolls report that is expected to show a fall in the number of jobs created last month.
The Federal Reserve kept interest rates on hold at more than two-decade highs on Wednesday, as widely expected, but Chair Jerome Powell prompted a hefty selloff after he reined in hopes that the central bank would soon start to cut interest rates.
“We estimate payrolls rose 215,000 in January, the unemployment,” {{0|Morgan Stanley said, with wage growth expected to grow 0.3% on the month.
(Peter Nurse contributed to this report.)
