S&P 500 Rides Tech Rally as Easing Inflation Pushes U.S. Yields Lower
By Yasin Ebrahim
Investing.com -- The S&P 500 jumped Wednesday, led by tech on falling U.S. Treasury yields as data pointing to signs that inflation may be nearing a peak eased fears that the Federal Reserve will have to continue with aggressive rate hikes.
The S&P 500 rose 1.9%, the Dow Jones Industrial Average gained 1.5%, or 481 points, the Nasdaq was up 2.6%.
The U.S. consumer price index, a measure of inflation, was flat in June compared with expectations for a 0.2% rise. In the 12 months through July, headline inflation eased to 8.5% from 9.1% in June but was still the highest since 1981.
The data suggested that inflation has “passed its peak,” Commerzbank said, as the “collapse in the price of gasoline played a decisive role.”
U.S. Treasury yields slumped as investors bet on a less hawkish Fed, with the 2-year Treasury yield, which is sensitive to fed rate hikes, slipping more than 2%.
Tech stocks, which have had a rocky start to the week following pressure from falling chip stocks this week, were aided by falling Treasury yields, which make valuations on growth stocks like tech more attractive.
Google-parent Alphabet (NASDAQ:GOOGL), and Meta (NASDAQ:META), led the gains for big tech, while Apple (NASDAQ:AAPL), and Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT) were up more than 2% each.
Twitter (NYSE:TWTR), meanwhile, gained more than 2% on bets that the social media giant may win its legal battle with Tesla (NASDAQ:TSLA) chief executive Elon Musk to force the billionaire to complete his $44 billion deal to buy the company.
The Tesla CEO sold nearly $7 billion in Tesla shares over the past few days, to “avoid an emergency sale of Tesla stock” should Twitter force the deal to close, Musk said.
“[T]he chances of a Twitter deal now more likely,” Wedbush analyst Daniel Ives said, and raised the price target on Twitter to $50 from $30. reflecting the “higher chances the deal now ultimately closes.”
Financials, mostly banks, were also in ascendency as the Treasury yield curve steepened, though remained inverted pointing to ongoing fears of a recession, albeit a milder downturn somewhat, following the latest inflation data and strong jobs report last week.
The 2-year Treasury yield over 10-year yield steepened to 40 basis points following a dip to lower than negative 50 basis intraday.
Signature Bank (NASDAQ:SBNY), Synchrony Financial (NYSE:SYF), and SVB Financial Group (NASDAQ:SIVB) were among the biggest gainers, with the latter up more than 9%.
Energy stocks lagged the broader market move higher as oil prices pared some early-day gains after data showing U.S. weekly inventories jumped by a more-than-expected 5.5 million barrels last week.
In earnings news, Coinbase Global (NASDAQ:COIN) climbed 7% as the crypto exchange operator's wider-than-expected loss was overshadowed by a jump in bitcoin.
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