WALL STREET ENDS HIGHER FOLLOWING 7 WEEKS OF DECLINES
S&P 500 coming off its longest weekly losing streak since 2001
Stocks closed broadly higher Monday, an upbeat start to the week on Wall Street after seven weeks of declines that nearly ended the bull market that began in March 2020.
The S&P 500 rose 1.9 percent, with technology and financial sector stocks doing much of the heavy lifting for the benchmark index. The Dow rose 2 percent and the Nasdaq climbed 1.6 percent.
The recent heavy selling on the market has primed traders to snap up big tech stocks and shares in other companies that had been high flyers before the market’s punishing skid, said Quincy Krosby, chief equity strategist for LPL Financial.
“What we’re seeing today is traders and investors coming in and taking advantage of the lower (price) levels,” she said. “This is the tug-of-war in the market between those saying the market has become attractively valued, versus those who are saying ‘not really,’ because it’s not factoring in much slower growth.”
The S&P 500 gained 72.39 points to 3,973.75. The Dow added 618.34 points to 31,880.24, and the tech-heavy Nasdaq picked up 180.66 points to 11,535.27.
Smaller company stocks also staged a rally. The Russell 2000 rose 19.50 points, or 1.1 percent, to
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are doing it for thousands of items like most large-scale kitchens are — it just takes away a lot of that tedium and a lot of those burdens and digitizes it.”
Founded in 2017 by brothers-in-law Koltai and Ian Christopher, the company said its subscription revenue grew 280 percent last year and 146 percent in the first quarter.
Koltai declined to say how many food service providers large and small use its subscription software. But customers include Harvest Table, a division of industry giant Aramark. It provides food service to colleges and
universities. DoorDash Kitchens, Thistle and &pizza are also customers.
Reducing food waste is a key part of Galley’s pitch. Up to 40 billion pounds of food waste is generated each year across the food service industry, according to the company. Galley claims data from its software has allowed customers to cut food waste
by an average of 25 percent.
Koltai, a software engineer, first designed a food cost software tool for Sprig — an early food delivery and ghost kitchen firm in the Bay Area. Sprig shut down in 2017. But Koltai realized that automating food data for the kitchen — replacing manual data entry on spreadsheets — could fill a need across the
industry. So he joined Christopher, whose background was in hospitality and locally sourced food, to launch Galley.
The software plugs into vendor systems to serve up real-time recipe costs, which act as the starting point for predictive purchasing, smart inventory and accurate food production planning tools to boost profit margins per dish and across the menu.
If costs for a dish are higher than normal, for example, chefs and cooks can pinpoint the pricey ingredient and then buy from a different supplier, substitute ingredients or take other steps to maintain profit margins.
The funding round was led by Astanor Ventures, an impact investment fund focused on food systems and sustainability. The round also included participation from existing investor Zetta Venture Partners.
“Astanor is pleased to support Galley Solutions’ unique approach to drive change by focusing on a diverse set of menu and kitchen efficiencies,” said George Powlick, partner at Astanor, in a statement. “Galley’s mission is deeply aligned with Astanor’s to affect measurable and positive systemic change in the food system.”