Apple, Amazon lead climb after market losses
After four days of modest losses, Apple and Amazon led the U.S. stock market to small gains yesterday. Internet and health care companies rose while mining companies fell with metals prices.
Apple and Amazon are the two most valuable U.S. companies, and analysts said each stock should keep climbing. Other market favorites including Facebook and Google parent, Alphabet, also rose.
Interest rates slipped for a second day, which led to losses for banks, while the stronger dollar weighed on metals prices and on shares of the companies that mine those metals. Smaller companies, which have struggled in September, also fell.
Scott Wren, senior global equity strategist for the Wells Fargo Investment Institute, said investors have been reluctant to get back into the stock market since the 200809 recession, and there are signs that’s changing.
“Retail investors have been underinvested for this whole expansion,” he said. “The economy is decent. The market is correctly pricing in a relatively low possibility of an all-out trade war.”
The S&P 500 index rose 8.03 points, or 0.3 percent, to 2,914. Despite its recent losing streak, the benchmark index is up more than 7 percent since the end of June. With one day left in the third quarter, the S&P 500 is on track for its best quarter since the end of 2013.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average gained 54.65 points, or 0.2 percent, to 26,439.93. The Nasdaq Composite climbed 51.60 points, or 0.6 percent, to 8,041.97.