Stan Choe
Most US stocks are rising as oil prices ease, but slumps for influential artificial-intelligence winners are keeping Wall Street in check.
The S&P 500 added 0.4 per cent a day after dropping from its all-time high and coming just short of its longest winning streak in three decades. The Dow Jones was up 812 points, or 1.6 per cent, in mid-afternoon trade and the Nasdaq composite was 0.1 per cent higher. The Australian sharemarket is set to rise, with futures at 4.53am AEST pointing to a gain of 32 points, or 0.4 per cent, at the open. The ASX slumped by 1.1 per cent on Thursday.
A clear majority of stocks on Wall Street climbed, including 2 out of every 3 in the S&P 500. They got a boost from a 3.5 per cent drop for the price of Brent crude oil to $US94.43 per barrel. That gave back a chunk of its rise this week caused by the latest flare-ups of fighting between Iran and the United States and its allies.
The expectation on Wall Street seems to be that the United States and Iran will ultimately agree to reopen the Strait of Hormuz to oil tankers. That would hopefully improve the flow of crude, lower oil’s price and remove some of the upward pressure on inflation that’s hurting the world. Such hopes, along with strong profit reports from US companies, helped launch the S&P 500 on a nine-day winning streak that ended Wednesday.
Elanco Animal Health rose 1.5 per cent, and Zoetis, which sells animal vaccines, climbed 2.5 per cent on expectations for stronger profits after the US Department of Agriculture confirmed Wednesday that the New World screwworm fly has reached south Texas. It’s the first time in decades that the parasite with flesh-eating larvae has threatened the nation’s cattle industry.
Toro added 1.6 per cent after the seller of mowers and other equipment became the latest US company to deliver better profit and revenue for the latest quarter than analysts expected. CEO Richard Olson said Toro saw strong demand across its products, and the company raised its forecasts for revenue and profit over its full fiscal year.
Several other companies also joined the long list of those topping analysts’ profit expectations, but many nevertheless dropped, particularly in the high-flying technology industry.
Broadcom sank 11.8 per cent, even though both profit and revenue for the chip company surpassed analysts’ expectations. CEO Hock Tan said its AI semiconductor revenue more than doubled to $US10.8 billion ($15.1 billion) during the quarter and that demand is only getting bigger. He is forecasting AI semiconductor growth to top 200 per cent in the current quarter.
Investors, though, may have been expecting even more after Broadcom’s stock came into the day with a 38.5 per cent surge for the year so far. That towered over the already strong 10.3 per cent rise for the S&P 500 index, and Broadcom has grown to become Wall Street’s sixth-biggest stock and one of its most influential.
Analysts have been saying AI stocks may have run too high, becoming too expensive, and that the broad US stock market may be set for a slowdown following an unrelenting streak of nine straight winning weeks for the S&P 500, its longest since 2023.
Other AI winners likewise gave back some of their big gains. Micron Technology, the latest company to see its total value top $US1 trillion because of AI euphoria, fell 5.3 per cent.
CrowdStrike Holdings dropped 4.8 per cent even though the cybersecurity company’s profit and revenue for the latest quarter topped analysts’ expectations. CEO George Kurtz said the latest quarter was when “the worlds of cybersecurity and frontier AI collided,” and the company said it’s splitting its stock to make its share price more affordable.
But its stock came into the day with a 59.5 per cent surge for the year so far. And analysts said it beat forecasts for some financial measures by less than it usually does.
Outside of tech, PVH Corp., the company behind the Calvin Klein and Tommy Hilfiger brands, tumbled 23.7 per cent even though it also beat Wall Street’s first-quarter sales and profit targets. CEO Stefan Larsson warned that it’s feeling “the prolonged effects of the Middle East conflict, which is putting pressure on” customers in the region.
In the bond market, Treasury yields eased with oil prices. The yield on the 10-year Treasury fell to 4.46 per cent from 4.49 per cent late Wednesday. That can lessen the pressure on not only stock prices but also the economy in general.
Easier interest rates can help smaller companies in particular because many need to borrow money to grow. The Russell 2000 index of the smallest US stocks jumped 1.3 per cent
Reports on the US economy, meanwhile, came in mixed. One said that slightly more US workers applied for unemployment benefits last week, which could indicate a slowdown in the relatively solid US job market. Another report said that productivity for US workers improved by less during the first three months of the year than economists expected.
In stock markets abroad, indexes ticked higher in Europe following a weaker finish in Asia.
South Korea’s Kospi fell 1.8 per cent, Hong Kong’s Hang Seng dropped 1.5 per cent and Japan’s Nikkei 225 fell 1.4 per cent for some of the larger losses.
AP
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