Major stock indexes end with modest gains

Wall Street capped a choppy day of trading with modest gains Wednesday, as investors focused on some strong earnings reports from Big Tech companies while remaining cautiously optimistic that Washington will deliver more economic stimulus.

The S&P 500 inched up 0.1 percent after swinging between a gain of 0.6 percent and a loss of 0.3 percent. The tiny gain extended the benchmark index’s winning streak to a third day. Energy, communications and financial stocks helped lift the market. Those gains were primarily kept in check by declines in companies that rely on consumer spending and technology stocks. Treasury yields and oil prices rose.

Investors continued to watch shares of companies such as Game Stop and AMC Entertainment, which have been targeted by a community of online investors seeking to force their stock prices higher.

“There’s a tug of war that’s been brewing for a week or so now, that markets are ripe for a correction and whether the events of last week are a precipitating event,” said Jamie Cox, managing partner at Harris Financial Group.

The S&P 500 rose 3.86 points to 3,830.17. The Dow Jones Industrial Average gained 36.12 points, or 0.1 percent, to 30,723.60. The techheavy Nasdaq slipped 2.23 points, or less than 0.1 percent, to 13,610.54. The index had briefly been above its all-time high set last week.

Smaller companies fared better than the broader market. The Russell 2000 small-caps index rose 8.26 points, or 0.4 percent, to 2,159.70. The index is up 9.4 percent this year, while the S&P 500 is up about 2 percent and the Nasdaq is up 5.6 percent.

Shares of Amazon dropped 2 percent after founder Jeff Bezos said Tuesday he would be stepping down as CEO.

Google’s parent company, Alphabet, jumped 7.3 percent after reporting a blowout quarter as its digital advertising machine regained momentum.

GameStop and other recently high-flying stocks notched modest gains Wednesday. GameStop rose 2.7 percent and AMC climbed 14.7 percent. The stocks have been caught up in a speculative frenzy by traders in online forums who seek to inflict damage on Wall Street hedge funds that have bet the stocks would fall. GameStop plunged 60 percent on Tuesday, and AMC Entertainment lost 41.2 percent.

Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen has called for a meeting with the Securities and Exchange Commission, Federal Reserve and others to determine “whether recent activities are consistent with investor protection and fair and efficient markets,” White House press secretary Jen Psaki said.

Energy companies rose as the price of crude oil jumped 1.7 percent. Exxon Mobil rose 3.9 percent and Schlumberger gained 7.4 percent.