Wall Street soars near record highs after Biden Bounces At Reuters

By Devik Jain and Medha Singh

(Reuters) – Wall Street’s key indices hovered near record highs on Thursday as investors counted on more pandemic relief and rapid rollout of vaccines under the Biden government to support the economy after data repaired a weakening in the labor market.

The Labor Department’s report last week amounted to 900,000 people who had submitted unemployment benefits. The increased reading was probably due to a relentless increase in COVID-19 cases across the country.

While the benchmark and the blue-chip Dow at 10:00 a.m. ET was after achieving the past two sessions, the shares in the technology heavyweights Alphabet (NASDAQ 🙂 Inc, Apple Inc (NASDAQ 🙂 and Amazon.com rose. Inc. (NASDAQ 🙂 increased the Nasdaq by 0.2%.

“Markets are definitely priced to perfection,” said Chris Osmond, chief investment officer at Prime Capital Investment Advisors in Overland Park, Kansas.

“If there are ongoing accidents in the deployment of a vaccine, it could cause a twist in expectations. Also (Biden’s proposed stimulus) will not only oppose the Republican Party opposition, but also moderate Democrats, too. standing, which can also cause some market failures. ‘

Democrats took control of the U.S. Senate on Wednesday, and Republicans in Congress have indicated they want to work on Biden’s $ 1.1 billion stimulus plan that will increase unemployment benefits and provide direct control to households.

President Joe Biden is expected to launch a variety of initiatives during his first day in office, including testing build-up and vaccine deployment.

Three of the 11 S&P sectors rose in early trading, with communications services and the discretionary use of consumers.

Energy, financial and industrial stocks, which have helped the S&P 500 up 14% since the November 3 presidential election, fell between 0.3% and 1.3%.

As valuations are almost 20 years high, corporate results can provide an important test of whether the stocks in the stock market have the basic advantage.

Earnings at S&P 500 companies are expected to rise by 24% in 2021 after falling by 15% in 2020, according to Refinitiv data from 15 January.

United Airlines Holdings (NASDAQ 🙂 Inc fell 5.2% after posting a fourth-quarter loss due to the COVID-19 pandemic, but said it expects about $ 2 billion in annual costs by 2023 to prune.

Baker Hughes Co climbed 1.1% when it joined bigger rival Halliburton (NYSE 🙂 Co by saying the worst slump in the energy industry should fall in decades this year.

Pipeline operator Kinder Morgan Inc. (NYSE 🙂 rose 1.2% after beating Wall Street’s estimates for quarterly results, even as it expressed concern about the pace of growth in spending in the best US shale basins following a recovery in oil prices .

Ford Motor (NYSE 🙂 Co jumped 3.6% and extended profits for a second consecutive day Deutsche Bank (DE 🙂 has raised its price target on the US carmaker’s share.