The S&P 500 rose 17.47, or 0.4%, to 4,697.53 and clinched an all-time high for the seventh straight day. The Dow Jones Industrial Average gained 203.72, or 0.6%, to 36,327.95, and the Nasdaq composite added 31.28, or 0.2%, to 15,971.59.
Trading was scattershot, though, and after climbing to an early gain of 0.8%, the S&P 500 at one point gave up virtually all of it. Stocks retrenched in the middle of the day as
The 10-year yield, which tends to move with expectations for the economy and inflation, dropped to 1.45% and is near its lowest level since September. It was at 1.58% just two days earlier. Analysts had varying explanations for that and other sharp moves in the bond market, which some called counterintuitive.
The Dow and Nasdaq nevertheless still joined the S&P 500 in setting all-time highs. The smaller stocks in the Russell 2000 performed even better, jumping 1.4%
An encouraging report from
The headline report of the day was the one from the
One potential worry spot for markets was a big jump in workers' wages, up 4.9% from a year earlier, which can feed into concerns about inflation. But the numbers were relatively in line with economists' expectations.
“It was one of those Goldilocks reports,” said
That's why it was surprising that the 10-year
One possible reason was that investors see more people heading back to work as helping to clear the supply-chain bottlenecks that have hit the economy and driven up inflation, said
“The more people we get back to fill open positions will help keep that shortage pressure at bay a little bit,” said
But the degree of moves in the bond market still took market watchers by surprise.
“Some of these moves look extreme to me,”
A day earlier, bond markets around the world shook after the
For stocks, the trend has been solidly upward recently as a parade of companies has reported stronger profit for the summer than analysts expected. More than four out of five companies in the S&P 500 have topped forecasts, with roughly 90% of reports in hand, according to FactSet. Companies in the index appear on track to report 39% growth in their quarterly earnings per share over year-ago levels, which would be the third-fastest since 2010.
Online travel company Expedia jumped 15.6% and home-sharing company Airbnb rose 13% after they each reported stronger profits than expected.
On the losing end was exercise equipment maker
Health care stocks were also lagging the market.
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