Wall Street drifts near its record heights
NEW YORK — The U.S. stock market is nearing record highs Tuesday as the floodgates open for companies to report profits they made over the summer.
The S&P 500 slipped 0.1% in morning trading and is 0.4% below its all-time high set earlier this month. The Dow Jones Industrial Average was up 155 points, or 0.3%, as of 10:30 a.m. Eastern Time, and the Nasdaq Composite Index was down 0.3%.
General Motors rose 14.3% after reporting quarterly results that beat analysts’ expectations, while also raising its forecasts for some full-year financial targets. CEO Mary Barra said she is moving quickly to cut losses in 2026 and beyond for its electric vehicle business because “it is now clear” that electric vehicle adoption will be lower than expected.
RTX, the aerospace and defense company, and Danaher, the life sciences and diagnostics company, also posted gains of more than 6.5% after reporting a profit last quarter that was better than analysts expected. Coca-Cola rose 3.3% after also beating Wall Street profit expectations.
Warner Bros. Discovery jumped 9.2% after the company said it was now considering options other than the previously announced spinoff of Discovery Global from Warner Bros. that could be more profitable for shareholders. The company said it made the decision after hearing from “multiple parties” interested in either the entire company or Warner Bros.
They helped offset a decline in PulteGroup, which fell 2.2% even though the homebuilder posted a higher profit than analysts expected. Northrop Grumman slipped 0.8% after its revenue for the latest quarter fell short of analysts’ forecasts.
Several Big Tech stocks lost momentum, pausing their own rally, and also kept the market in check. One of the heaviest weights in the S&P 500 was a 1.9% decline for Google parent Alphabet from its all-time high. Nvidia fell 1.3%.
Other recent big winners in financial markets have also taken a break. The price of gold fell 4.4% from its last record high, falling to $4,167.00 per ounce. So far, it’s still up almost 58% for the year.
The pressure is on companies to show their profits are growing after a torrid 35% rally for the S&P 500 from its April low. It’s a way for them to justify the high price of their shares when critics consider them too expensive.
Corporate earnings reports have also gained importance because they provide details on the strength of the U.S. economy as the U.S. government shutdown has delayed important economic updates. That makes the Federal Reserve’s job more difficult as it tries to decide whether high inflation or a slowing job market is the more important problem for the economy.
Despite the shutdown, the Commerce Department will release its consumer price report on Friday, which could help guide the Fed’s interest rate policy. This is the first publication of government data since the start of confinement on October 1.
In foreign stock markets, indices rose in much of Europe and Asia.
Japan’s Nikkei 225 index gained 0.3% and neared the 50,000 level as conservative lawmaker Sanae Takaichi became the country’s prime minister. Investors expect her to push for lower interest rates and other policies that could help the market.
Indexes rose 1.4% in Shanghai and 0.7% in Hong Kong amid expectations that President Donald Trump would meet Chinese President Xi Jinping later this month at a regional summit. This raises hopes of an easing of trade tensions between the world’s largest economies.
On the bond market, the yield on 10-year Treasury bills fell to 3.95% from 4.00% Monday evening.
AP Business writers Matt Ott and Elaine Kurtenbach contributed.
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