Strong Earnings Propel Indexes by Noon



U.S. stock indexes gained on Tuesday as major companies continued to report strong third-quarter earnings, easing concerns that persistent COVID cases and rising costs would derail corporate America’s profit recovery.

The Dow Jones Industrials vaulted 179.13 points to 35,437.74.

The S&P 500 gained 29.44 points to 4,515.90.

The NASDAQ Composite spiked 99.23 points to 15,121.04.

Dow member Travelers saw its shares gain more than 3% after the insurance company’s quarterly earnings report topped expectations.
Johnson & Johnson also beat third-quarter earnings expectations by 25 cents per share. The health-care stock ticked up around 3%.

Procter & Gamble continued the bullish trend with better-than-expected earnings, but its shares dipped more than 1%. The consumer products giant said it is raising prices to cover rising commodity and freight costs and warned that inflation may continue.

Elsewhere, Walmart shares gained more than 1% after Goldman Sachs added the big box retailer to its conviction buy list, saying the stock could rally nearly 40%.

As of Tuesday morning, 82% of S&P 500 companies that have reported earnings beat expectations, according to FactSet. Taking into account those reports and estimates for those to come, third-quarter profit growth will come in at 30%,

Other major reports after the bell Tuesday include Netflix and United Airlines.

Prices for 10-year Treasurys lost some ground, raising yields to 1.63% from Monday’s 1.59%. Treasury prices and yields move in opposite directions.

Oil prices regained 83 cents to $82.37 U.S. a barrel.

Gold prices regrouped 4.80 to $1,770.500 U.S. an ounce.