Advertisment
The S&P 500 crossed the 4,000 threshold for the first time on Thursday as Wall Street built on a solid March following the rollout of President Joe Biden’s infrastructure plan.
The Dow Jones Industrials went into orbit 148.74 points to pause for lunch at 33,130.29.
The S&P 500 picked up 36.66 points, to 4,009.55.
The NASDAQ Composite recouped 199.28 points, or 1.6%, to 13,446.15. Alphabet and Microsoft gained more than 2% each, while Amazon, Facebook and Netflix all rose over 1%.
Wall Street just wrapped up March with solid gains. The Dow jumped 6.6%, and the S&P 500 climbed 4.3%, last month, posting their best months since November. The NASDAQ gained 0.4% in March as tech stocks came under pressure amid rising interest rates.
Microsoft shares rose 1.2% on news that the software giant will deliver to the U.S. Army more than 120,000 devices based on its HoloLens augmented reality headset. The contract will be worth $21.9 billion over 10 years.
The upward movement in stocks came after Biden introduced his multi-trillion-dollar infrastructure proposal. The plan includes spending on roads and bridges as well as green energy and water system upgrades. This marks the second major spending push of Biden’s presidency after he signed a $1.9-trillion relief and stimulus bill on March 11.
The plan Biden outlined Wednesday includes roughly $2 trillion in spending over eight years and would raise the corporate tax rate to 28% to fund it.
Still, some on Wall Street grew worried that higher taxes could pose a threat to rebounding corporate earnings and stock prices.
In deal news, Micron Technology and Western Digital are said to be exploring a deal to buy Japanese semiconductor firm Kioxia for about $30 billion, according to a Wall Street Journal report. Micron shares jumped more than 5% on the news, while Western Digital was up about 4.8%.
On the data front, an index of U.S. manufacturing activity jumped to a reading of 64.7 last month from 60.8 in February, according to the Institute for Supply Management. That was the highest level since December 1983.
Investors digested a worse-than-expected reading on weekly jobless claims Thursday. First-time claims for unemployment insurance for the week ended March 27 totaled 719,000, higher than 675,000 expected by economists.
The key March jobs report will be released on Friday, although the stock market will be closed for the Good Friday holiday. Economists expect 630,000 jobs were added in March, and the unemployment rate fell to 6% from 6.2%, according to Dow Jones.
Prices for 10-Year Treasurys leaped, lowering yields to 1.67% from Wednesday’s 1.74%. Treasury prices and yields move in opposite directions.
Oil prices regained 53 cents to $59.69 U.S. a barrel.
Gold prices gained $13.40 to $1,729.00.
