Traders work on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange.
Lucas Jackson | Portal
The Dow Jones Industrial Average rose on Thursday as traders weighed new inflation data that raised hopes the Federal Reserve could begin cutting interest rates next year. Wall Street is poised to end November with its strongest monthly gains in over a year.
The 30-stock Dow gained 271 points, or 0.8%. The S&P 500 gained 0.1%, while the Nasdaq Composite lost 0.2%.
The Dow was eyeing a new closing high for 2023 and was trading near its previous closing high in August. It was also inches away from an intraday high of the year. The S&P 500 and Nasdaq Composite traded about 1% away from their respective 2023 highs.
Leading the Dow on Thursday was cloud software company Salesforce, which rose more than 7.5% on better-than-expected earnings and revenue in its fiscal third quarter. Behind the positive report were Salesforce’s cloud data business, whose revenue rose 22% year over year, and its artificial intelligence product Einstein GPT.
Data released early Thursday showed the personal consumption expenditure price index – the Federal Reserve’s favorite inflation indicator – rose in line with expectations in October, rising 0.2% month-on-month and 3.5% year-on-year. increased. The numbers could provide an incentive for the Fed to keep interest rates stable before cutting them in 2024.
Although interest rates remain at higher levels, strategist Jay Woods has no fear of stocks giving back their gains before the end of the year.
“For me the cycle is complete. “We have regained what we lost and now we are starting to build on what we achieved at the end of 2021 when the market was hot,” the chief global strategist at Freedom Capital Markets told CNBC. “The price movement is positive. The economic data supporting the Fed to continue to keep interest rates low and potentially cut them is a huge tailwind.”
The major averages remain on track to end November with significant gains, ending a three-month losing streak for the indices. The S&P 500 rose 8.6% in November, while the Nasdaq gained 11%. Both averages indicate their best monthly performance since July 2022. The Dow rose 7.8% in November, on track for its best month since October 2022.