Wall Street's celebration over the all-time highs for the Dow Jones industrials came and went in the past week, and investors are now looking ahead with guarded optimism.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average of 30 blue-chip stocks advanced 1.47 percent in the past week to 11,850.21, after breaking all-time highs hit in January 2000.
The broad-market Standard & Poor's 500 increased 1.02 percent on the week to 1,349.58 and the NASDAQ composite rallied 1.84 percent to 2,299.99.
The market continued its steady advance amid a few economic and corporate reports that appeared to suggest the US economy is slowing, although not enough to tip into recession.
The major economic report of the week came on Friday, showing 51,000 new jobs were created, a sign of cooling conditions but -- mostly due to upward revisions in prior reports -- not as weak as the headline appeared.
A key to sustaining Wall Street's gains, analysts say, will be the wave of corporate earnings reports that will show how profits are holding up in a decelerating economy.
"We generally expect good news as earnings warnings delivered to Wall Street haven't involved many high-profile names and have been fewer than what we had previously expected for the quarter given the publicity surrounding the economic slowdown," said Fred Dickson, market strategist at DA Davidson.
"We are expecting financial, healthcare, technology and telecom stocks to deliver good news. We are expecting disappointing news from the auto makers, industrial materials, home builders, companies supplying those industries and many energy companies due to the recent decline in natural gas and crude oil prices," Dickson said.
Bonds lost ground in the past week amid a shift into equities. The yield on the 10-year Treasury bond rose to 4.696 percent from 4.633 percent a week earlier, while that on the 30-year bond increased to 4.837 percent against 4.767 percent.
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FIVE-YEAR WINDOW? A defense institute CEO said a timeline for a potential Chinese invasion was based on expected ‘tough measures’ when Xi Jinping seeks a new term Most Taiwanese are willing to defend the nation against a Chinese attack, but the majority believe Beijing is unlikely to invade within the next five years, a poll showed yesterday. The poll carried out last month was commissioned by the Institute for National Defense and Security Research, a Taipei-based think tank, and released ahead of Double Ten National Day today, when President William Lai (賴清德) is to deliver a speech. China maintains a near-daily military presence around Taiwan and has held three rounds of war games in the past two years. CIA Director William Burns last year said that Chinese President Xi Jinping
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President William Lai (賴清德) yesterday said that China has “no right to represent Taiwan,” but stressed that the nation was willing to work with Beijing on issues of mutual interest. “The Republic of China has already put down roots in Taiwan, Penghu, Kinmen and Matsu,” Lai said in his first Double Ten National Day address outside the Presidential Office Building in Taipei. “And the Republic of China and the People’s Republic of China [PRC] are not subordinate to each other.” “The People’s Republic of China has no right to represent Taiwan,” he said at the event marking the 113th National Day of
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