S&P 500 ends 2-day losing streak as tech leads stocks higher

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.

Levi Strauss soared as the storied jeans maker went public for the second time.

The latest gains erased the market’s modest losses from a day earlier, when the Federal Reserve said 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.

Major European stock indexes finished mostly lower.

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.