[ad_1]
(For a live Reuters blog on the US, UK and EU stock markets, click LIVE / or type LIVE / in a news window)
* Cisco and Disney gain traction after quarterly reports
* Auction helpers talk about COVID restrictions targeted against nationwide lockdown
* Index up: Dow 1.31%, S&P 1.14%, Nasdaq 0.61% (late afternoon updates, comments added, New York date, online changes)
NEW YORK, Nov. 13 (Reuters) – Wall Street gained ground on Friday with upbeat earnings reports helping to spark optimism about the economy even as investors weighed the current surge in virus cases against hopes of success of COVID-19 vaccines.
After a volatile week of trading where the market was whipped between hopes and fears around the virus, Cisco Systems Inc led the winners among the S&P 500 after its quarterly report showed increased demand related to work from home .
As the network equipment maker jumped 7%, Walt Disney Co grew 2%, its streaming video business grew rapidly, and a partial recovery in its theme parks tempered its quarterly loss.
The reports have likely helped investors look past the current spike in virus cases and a gloomy winter ahead, said Tom Martin, senior portfolio manager at Globalt Investments in Atlanta.
“We know we have tough times ahead, but in mid-2021 you can potentially see that with a vaccine and better treatment instead of the more damaging coronavirus, you see there is a recovery. coming up, ”Martin said. “You are at that time of year when people are starting to look towards 2021.”
Martin also highlighted the hope that Moderna Inc MRNA.O is set to release details on the progress of its vaccine, after the company said on Wednesday it had enough data for a first interim analysis of the late-stage trial of its investigational COVID-19 vaccine.
Friday’s outperformance of more economically sensitive sectors, notably energy, up 4%, and industrials, up 1.9%, versus growing sectors like tech, up 0.5%, indicated “optimism about the recovery of the economy”, according to Martin.
As of 2:57 p.m. EST, the Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 398.05 points, or 1.37%, to 29,478.22, the S&P 500 had gained 43.88 points, or 1.24%, to 3,580.89 and the Nasdaq Composite added 91.81 points, or 0.78%, to 11,801.40.
With third quarter reports released by around 90% of S&P 500 companies, Refinitiv IBES estimates now show profits down 7.8% from a year ago compared to the Oct. 1 forecast of a down 21.4%.
All three major U.S. stock indices fell on Thursday, as more than a dozen U.S. states reported a doubling of new COVID-19 cases in the past two weeks, as the mayor of Chicago issued a stay notice to the one month home.
But a senior adviser to President-elect Joe Biden said there are no nationwide lockdown plans next year and instead spoke of restrictions for specific regions when the virus has spread bad there. .
The first positive data from a large vaccine study earlier this week prompted a rotation in cyclical sectors and put the S&P 500 and Dow on track for their second consecutive weekly gains.
However, the highly tech Nasdaq was heading for a weekly decline as investors saw profits in tech stocks, which took advantage of a home environment.
Meanwhile, Biden’s victory in the battlefield state of Arizona has widened his electoral voting margin, but the official transition remains in limbo as President Donald Trump refuses to concede.
Growth stocks, currently largely made up of tech companies, edged up 0.3%, while value stocks, which currently mainly include cyclical stocks such as banks and energy, rose 1.0%. 8%.
Rising issues outnumbered falling issues on the NYSE by a ratio of 4.44 to 1; on the Nasdaq, a ratio of 2.49 to 1 favored the advancers.
The S&P 500 posted eight new 52-week highs and no new lows; the Nasdaq Composite recorded 67 new highs and 11 new lows. (Additional reporting by Stephen Culp in New York, Medha Singh and Shivani Kumaresan in Bengaluru; Editing by Saumyadeb Chakrabarty, Shounak Dasgupta and Tom Brown)
[ad_2]
Source link