Tech boosts stocks to snap two-day slide

Technology companies powered a broad rally for U.S. stocks Thursday, snapping the market’s two-day losing streak.

Apple and chipmakers led the wave of buying, helping to drive the technology sector to an overall gain of 2.5 percent. The sector is up 21.1 percent this year so far, well ahead of the S&P 500’s 10 other sectors.

Retailers and industrial companies also notched solid gains, which easily offset losses in financial stocks.

The latest gains erased the market’s modest losses from a day earlier, when the Federal Reserve said that it expected the U.S. economy to slow down and that it no longer expected to raise interest rates this year.

While investors appeared to be circumspect about the central bank’s economic outlook, any concerns seemed to take a backseat Thursday to the likelihood that the Fed will hold off on raising interest rates.

“Overall, stocks are rallying because interest rates have gone down and we know that the Fed is going to continue to be the market’s friend,” said Karyn Cavanaugh, senior markets strategist at Voya Investment Management. “There’s absolutely no reason not to be in stocks when you have an incredibly dovish Fed that is going to support asset prices.”

The S&P 500 index rose 30.65 points, or 1.1 percent, to 2,854.88. The Dow Jones Industrial Average gained 216.84 points, or 0.8 percent, to 25,962.51

The Nasdaq composite, which his heavily weighted with technology stocks, climbed 109.99 points, or 1.4 percent, to 7,838.96. The Russell 2000 index of smaller-company stocks picked up 19.25 points, or 1.2 percent, to 1,562.41.

Despite a couple of downbeat days, the S&P 500 is closing in on its second straight weekly gain. The benchmark index is up 13.9 percent so far in 2019. That’s better than the fullyear gains for the benchmark index in four of the past five years.

Thursday’s rally came as investors weighed the latest batch of company earnings reports and some key analyst stock upgrades.

Apple climbed 3.7 percent after analysts at Needham & Co. upgraded the technology giant’s stock to a strong “Buy,” saying the company’s new services initiatives could attract new users. The company has an event scheduled next Monday where presumably more announcements will be made.

Bond prices held steady Thursday. The yield on the 10-year Treasury note was unchanged at 2.53 percent.

Energy futures prices finished mixed. Benchmark U.S. crude slid 0.4 percent to settle at $59.98 a barrel. Brent crude fell 0.9 percent to close at $67.86 a barrel.

Wholesale gasoline added 0.2 percent to $1.92 a gallon, heating oil dropped 1 percent to $1.99 a gallon and natural gas was little changed at $2.82 per 1,000 cubic feet.

The dollar rose to 110.79 yen from 110.61 Japanese yen on Wednesday. The euro weakened to $1.1354 from $1.1446.