S&P 500 index closes at record high as stock rally continues across board
Wall Street capped a broad rally for stocks Thursday by driving the S&P 500 index to an all-time high.
The milestone, which eclipsed the benchmark index’s last record close on April 30, underscores a swift rebound for the market in June that has erased the losses from a 6.6% dive in May. The major U.S. stock indexes are up more than 7% so far this month.
Thursday’s rally came as investors balanced optimism over the possibility that the Federal Reserve will cut interest rates in response to a slowing global economy with jitters about the prospects of dimmer corporate profits should a severe slowdown take hold.
Those worries prompted traders to shift money into safe-haven assets this week, such as gold and U.S. government bonds. The yield on the 10-year Treasury briefly slid Thursday as low as 1.97% after falling a day earlier to 2.02%. The yield, which is used to set interest rates on mortgages and other loans, is the lowest it’s been since November 2016.
The price of gold, meanwhile, jumped 3.6%. Investors’ jitters over escalating tensions between the U.S. and Iran sent the price of U.S. crude oil 5.4% higher. Crude prices had been in a bear market just weeks ago, what Wall Street calls a drop of 20% or more.
The S&P 500 climbed 27.72 points, or 0.9%, to 2,954.18, a record high.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 249.17 points, or 0.9%, to 26,753.17. The Nasdaq gained 64.02 points, or 0.8%, to 8,051.34. The Russell 2000 index of smaller companies picked up 7.92 points, or 0.5%, to 1,563.49.