new York – US stocks held near record levels on Tuesday after an eight-day winning streak.
The S&P 500 was virtually unchanged in early trading, just 1% below its all-time high after falling nearly 10% below that mark earlier this month. The Dow Jones Industrial Average lost 82 points, or 0.2%, as of 9:35 a.m. Eastern time, and the Nasdaq Composite was 0.1% higher.
Palo Alto Networks led the market with a gain of 6.6%. The cybersecurity company was the latest major company to report higher earnings and revenue for the latest quarter than analysts expected. According to FactSet, companies in the S&P 500 are on track to post their best earnings-per-share growth since the end of 2021.
Lowe’s also beat analysts’ earnings forecasts in the spring, but the stock remained more cautious. The home improvement retailer said it was facing a difficult economic environment, “especially for homeowners,” and lowered its sales and profit forecasts for the current fiscal year. The stock fell 1.1 percent.
High interest rates are weighing on the economy after the Federal Reserve raised them sharply to bring inflation under control. US Treasury yields eased on Tuesday ahead of Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell’s speech on Friday, which is likely to be the highlight of the week for financial markets.
The economic symposium in Jackson Hole, Wyoming, where Powell will speak, has seen major policy announcements in the past. This time, expectations are not as high, as almost everyone already expects the Fed to start cutting interest rates next month.
The biggest question is whether the economy just needs the Federal Reserve to release the brakes, or whether it needs an extra nudge that requires deeper and faster cuts. A surprisingly weak report on U.S. employer hiring last month raised concerns that the Fed has already kept rates too high for too long, but subsequent reports on everything from inflation to U.S. retail sales helped bolster optimism.
The yield on 10-year Treasury notes fell to 3.84% from 3.87% late Monday.
On Wall Street, shares of the company behind Hawaiian Airlines rose 11.4% after it announced that its planned merger with the company behind Alaska Airlines had cleared a major regulatory hurdle. The deadline for U.S. antitrust authorities to review the deal has expired.
Alaska Air Group fell 0.2%.
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AP business writer Matt Ott contributed.
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