The Dow Jones Industrial Average on Friday barely reached a seventh straight record high, and the S&P 500 and NASDAQ also closed at a record as gains in Kraft Heinz Food Co helped offset selling in energy stocks.
After suffering losses for most of the session, the Dow and S&P 500 turned positive in the final minutes of a week fueled by the “Trump rally” that has seen stocks surge since the November last year US presidential election.
“Corporate earnings are fine, the economy’s fine, the Fed’s going to raise rates, and that’s great for financials,” LPL Financial chief economic strategist John Canally said.
Photo: Bloomberg
Kraft Heinz jumped 10.74 percent after it said it would continue to pursue a US$143 billion bid for Unilever PLC, despite being rebuffed. Unilever’s US-listed shares surged 14 percent.
Eight of the 11 major S&P sectors rose, with consumer staples adding 0.66 percent, helped by Kraft Heinz as well as a 4.32 percent increase in Colgate-Palmolive Co and a 4.19 percent rise in Kimberly-Clark Corp.
The S&P energy sector fell 0.53 percent as oil prices slipped.
Signs of a strengthening US economy as well as anticipated tax cuts were behind the most recent optimism.
With a strong fourth-quarter earnings season mostly complete, many investors say they need concrete signs of progress from US President Donald Trump on his policy plans.
Uncertainty around other potential Trump policies is an additional risk, some investors said.
“People are focusing on only the good of what his campaign promises were,” CFRA Research investment strategist Lindsey Bell said. “What makes me nervous is that it feels like the market is ignoring what could come on immigration, trade, healthcare — the negative implications that could come from a protectionist government.”
With a long weekend ahead in the US due to the Presidents’ Day holiday tomorrow, trading was a bit lighter than usual.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average rose a marginal 0.02 percent to end at 20,624.05, while the S&P 500 gained 0.17 percent to 2,351.16. The NASDAQ Composite added 0.41 percent to 5,838.58.
For the week, the Dow rose 1.7 percent, the S&P 500 added 1.5 percent and the NASDAQ gained 1.8 percent.
UnitedHealth Group Inc sank 3.68 percent after it was sued by the US Department of Justice over Medicare charges.
Declining issues outnumbered advancing ones on the New York Stock Exchange by a 1.15-to-1 ratio; on NASDAQ, a 1.26-to-1 ratio favored advancers.
The S&P 500 posted 46 new 52-week highs and one new low; the NASDAQ Composite recorded 141 new highs and 24 new lows.
About 6.4 billion shares changed hands on US exchanges on Friday, below the daily average of 6.8 billion over the past 20 sessions.
KEEPING UP: The acquisition of a cleanroom in Taiwan would enable Micron to increase production in a market where demand continues to outpace supply, a Micron official said Micron Technology Inc has signed a letter of intent to buy a fabrication site in Taiwan from Powerchip Semiconductor Manufacturing Corp (力積電) for US$1.8 billion to expand its production of memory chips. Micron would take control of the P5 site in Miaoli County’s Tongluo Township (銅鑼) and plans to ramp up DRAM production in phases after the transaction closes in the second quarter, the company said in a statement on Saturday. The acquisition includes an existing 12 inch fab cleanroom of 27,871m2 and would further position Micron to address growing global demand for memory solutions, the company said. Micron expects the transaction to
Vincent Wei led fellow Singaporean farmers around an empty Malaysian plot, laying out plans for a greenhouse and rows of leafy vegetables. What he pitched was not just space for crops, but a lifeline for growers struggling to make ends meet in a city-state with high prices and little vacant land. The future agriculture hub is part of a joint special economic zone launched last year by the two neighbors, expected to cost US$123 million and produce 10,000 tonnes of fresh produce annually. It is attracting Singaporean farmers with promises of cheaper land, labor and energy just over the border.
US actor Matthew McConaughey has filed recordings of his image and voice with US patent authorities to protect them from unauthorized usage by artificial intelligence (AI) platforms, a representative said earlier this week. Several video clips and audio recordings were registered by the commercial arm of the Just Keep Livin’ Foundation, a non-profit created by the Oscar-winning actor and his wife, Camila, according to the US Patent and Trademark Office database. Many artists are increasingly concerned about the uncontrolled use of their image via generative AI since the rollout of ChatGPT and other AI-powered tools. Several US states have adopted
A proposed billionaires’ tax in California has ignited a political uproar in Silicon Valley, with tech titans threatening to leave the state while California Governor Gavin Newsom of the Democratic Party maneuvers to defeat a levy that he fears would lead to an exodus of wealth. A technology mecca, California has more billionaires than any other US state — a few hundred, by some estimates. About half its personal income tax revenue, a financial backbone in the nearly US$350 billion budget, comes from the top 1 percent of earners. A large healthcare union is attempting to place a proposal before
RSS