Wall Street on Friday capped a mostly quiet week of trading with broad gains for stocks and more record highs for the major indices.
Technology and healthcare stocks powered much of the rally.
The S&P 500 notched its 10th winning week in the past 11. The benchmark index also finished with a record high for the fourth time this week.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average and NASDAQ Composite also ended the week at new highs.
Momentum for stocks has been clearly upward for months and the market is heading into what has historically been a seasonally good period.
Rising optimism about a “phase one” trade deal announced a week ago between the US and China has helped push stock indices to records.
Fears about a possible recession have also faded since the summer after the US Federal Reserve cut interest rates three times and appears set to keep them low for a long time.
“It’s just a benign continuation of the year-end rally based on no compelling reasons to scare people into selling,” Globalt Investments senior portfolio manager Tom Martin said.
“You have not a lot of reasons to sell; maybe a few reasons to buy. So, it’s just a very slow, low volume drift upward,” he said.
The S&P 500 on Friday rose 15.85 points, or 0.5 percent, to 3,221.22, jumping 1.7 percent from a close of 3,168.80 on Dec. 13. With less than two weeks left in this year, the S&P 500 is up 28.5 percent for the year.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average on Friday climbed 78.13 points, or 0.3 percent, to 28,455.09, an increase of 1.1 percent from 28,135.38 a week earlier.
The NASDAQ Composite on Friday added 37.74 points, or 0.4 percent, to 8,924.96, surging 2.2 percent from a close of 8,734.88 a week earlier.
The Russell 2000 index of smaller company stocks on Friday picked up 4.81 points, or 0.3 percent, to 1,671.90, a 2.1 percent leap from 1,637.98 on Dec. 13.
Roughly two stocks rose for every one that fell on the New York Stock Exchange.
The US and China last week agreed to cut tariffs on some of each other’s goods and postpone other tariff threats. The interim trade deal has helped ease a key source of uncertainty for investors heading into next year.
Encouraging reports on home construction, industrial production and other economic data earlier this week helped keep the rally going.
More good news arrived on Friday with a report showing that US households have continued to spend amid a healthy job market. That is making up for hesitance by businesses to spend and it is helping to keep the US economy growing at a moderate pace.
“What we’ve had in the last several weeks is a lessening of uncertainty,” Martin said.
Spending by US households has been the main pillar for the economy, even as CEOs turned cautious amid all the uncertainty created by US President Donald Trump’s trade wars.
Consumer last month spending rose 0.4 percent from October, the strongest growth in four months, US Department of Commerce data showed.
The increase in spending came as incomes rose 0.5 percent from a month earlier.
A separate report confirmed that the US economy grew at a moderate annual rate of 2.1 percent in the third quarter. Much of the growth from that July-to-September period came from stronger consumer spending.
Technology stocks accounted for a big slice of the market’s gains. Intel Corp rose 1.7 percent.
Healthcare and industrial stocks also notched solid gains. Cigna Corp climbed 3 percent and Union Pacific Corp added 1.7 percent.
Carnival Corp & PLC jumped 7.6 percent for the biggest gain in the S&P 500 after it reported stronger earnings for the latest quarter than analysts expected. The cruise ship operator also gave a profit forecast for the upcoming quarter that topped analysts’ forecasts.
Additional reporting by staff writer
CHIP RACE: Three years of overbroad export controls drove foreign competitors to pursue their own AI chips, and ‘cost US taxpayers billions of dollars,’ Nvidia said China has figured out the US strategy for allowing it to buy Nvidia Corp’s H200s and is rejecting the artificial intelligence (AI) chip in favor of domestically developed semiconductors, White House AI adviser David Sacks said, citing news reports. US President Donald Trump on Monday said that he would allow shipments of Nvidia’s H200 chips to China, part of an administration effort backed by Sacks to challenge Chinese tech champions such as Huawei Technologies Co (華為) by bringing US competition to their home market. On Friday, Sacks signaled that he was uncertain about whether that approach would work. “They’re rejecting our chips,” Sacks
NATIONAL SECURITY: Intel’s testing of ACM tools despite US government control ‘highlights egregious gaps in US technology protection policies,’ a former official said Chipmaker Intel Corp has tested chipmaking tools this year from a toolmaker with deep roots in China and two overseas units that were targeted by US sanctions, according to two sources with direct knowledge of the matter. Intel, which fended off calls for its CEO’s resignation from US President Donald Trump in August over his alleged ties to China, got the tools from ACM Research Inc, a Fremont, California-based producer of chipmaking equipment. Two of ACM’s units, based in Shanghai and South Korea, were among a number of firms barred last year from receiving US technology over claims they have
BARRIERS: Gudeng’s chairman said it was unlikely that the US could replicate Taiwan’s science parks in Arizona, given its strict immigration policies and cultural differences Gudeng Precision Industrial Co (家登), which supplies wafer pods to the world’s major semiconductor firms, yesterday said it is in no rush to set up production in the US due to high costs. The company supplies its customers through a warehouse in Arizona jointly operated by TSS Holdings Ltd (德鑫控股), a joint holding of Gudeng and 17 Taiwanese firms in the semiconductor supply chain, including specialty plastic compounds producer Nytex Composites Co (耐特) and automated material handling system supplier Symtek Automation Asia Co (迅得). While the company has long been exploring the feasibility of setting up production in the US to address
OPTION: Uber said it could provide higher pay for batch trips, if incentives for batching is not removed entirely, as the latter would force it to pass on the costs to consumers Uber Technologies Inc yesterday warned that proposed restrictions on batching orders and minimum wages could prompt a NT$20 delivery fee increase in Taiwan, as lower efficiency would drive up costs. Uber CEO Dara Khosrowshahi made the remarks yesterday during his visit to Taiwan. He is on a multileg trip to the region, which includes stops in South Korea and Japan. His visit coincided the release last month of the Ministry of Labor’s draft bill on the delivery sector, which aims to safeguard delivery workers’ rights and improve their welfare. The ministry set the minimum pay for local food delivery drivers at
RSS