NEW YORK: Wall Street’s key indexes gained on Thursday as investors assessed the latest batch of economic data and looked towards a key inflation metric and any signs of progress on a US funding bill.
Megacap growth stocks including Meta Platforms, Tesla, Alphabet and Nvidia reversed their early course to gain between 1.6% and 2.6%, steering a more than 1% jump in the tech-heavy Nasdaq.
At 12:12 p.m. ET, the Dow Jones Industrial Average was up 157.12 points, or 0.47%, at 33,707.39, the S&P 500 was up 32.36 points, or 0.76%, at 4,306.87, and the Nasdaq Composite was up 142.30 points, or 1.09%, at 13,235.15.
Data showed the US economy maintained a fairly solid pace of growth in the second quarter.
Separate readings showed initial jobless claims rose slightly last week - signaling tight labor market conditions - and a higher-than-expected fall in contracts to buy existing homes in August.
However, a looming US government shutdown and an ongoing strike by auto workers are seen dimming the outlook for the rest of 2023.
With just few days away from a shutdown resolution, investors awaited the Democratic-controlled Senate’s procedural vote on a bipartisan short term spending measure.
“With federal government spending at almost 7% of US GDP, a shutdown will slow down GDP growth,” said Philip Marey, senior US strategist at Rabobank.
Also on radar will be comments by Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell at 4 p.m. ET, while Chicago Fed President Austan Goolsbee noted the likelihood of changes to the central bank’s 2% inflation target once the current bout of inflation is over.
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