Wall Street closed with modest gains as earnings awaited
|Major equity indexes built on yesterday's gains on Thursday and closed the day with modest gains as financials and healthcare outperformed other major sectors.
Financial sector seems to be taking advantage of Fed Chairwoman Yellen's remarks, which suggested that rates were close to a "neutral" level and the bank might not need to hike the rates much more. The financial index .SPSY gained around 0.5%. In the meantime, the heightened expectations around the passage of the revised version of the health care bill helped the S&P 500 healthcare index .SPXHC add 0.23%.
Now with the Yellen's congressional testimony out of the way, investors are focused on the second quarter earnings. "Analysts estimate second-quarter earnings for S&P 500 companies rose 7.8 percent from a year ago. Companies had their best profit performance since 2011 in the first quarter, according to Thomson Reuters I/B/E/S" Reuters said.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 20.95 points, or 0.1%, to close the day at 21,553.09. The S&P 500 added 5.75 points, or 0.24%, to 2,445.75 and the Nasdaq Composite gained 13.27 points, or 0.21%, to 6,274.44.
Headlines from the U.S. session
- Rep. Senator Capito: Have “serious concerns” about medicaid provisions in revised proposal
- US: Federal deficit at larger-than-expected levels - Wells Fargo
- US Dollar Index recovers, still near 2017 lows
- CME Group FedWatch: December rate hike odds remain below 50%
- US Pres. Trump: Would invite Putin to the White House, but it's not the right time
- Rep. Senator Cruz: Will vote 'yes' to advance revised healthcare bill procedurally
- Fed's Kaplan: Future removal of accommodation should be done patiently, gradually
- Fed's Beige Book showed conundrum between positive US labor and missing inflation - UOB
- US CBO: Trump budget would result in average GDP growth over next decade
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