Wall Street climbed Monday ahead of a big week for central banks around the world, vaulting the S&P 500 to its highest level in more than a year. The benchmark index rose 40.07 points, or 0.9%, to 4,338.93 and its highest close since April 2022. The Dow Jones Industrial Average gained 189.55, or 0.6%, to 34,066.33, while the Nasdaq composite rallied 202.78, or 1.5%, to 13,461.92. The US stock market has been cruising on hopes the economy may avoid a recession and the Federal Reserve may soon take it easier on its hikes to interest rates. Traders are betting the Fed will hold rates steady at its next meeting, which concludes on Wednesday. That would be the first time it hasn’t hiked rates at a meeting in more than a year.
Investors see high-growth stocks as some of the biggest beneficiaries of lower rates, and they led the market Monday, the AP reports. Tech stocks alone accounted for more than half the S&P 500's gain, powered by gains of at least 1.5% for both Microsoft and Apple. Cruise operator Carnival, meanwhile, rode a 12.5% upswell as analysts upgraded its stock on signs demand remains steady for the industry and that pricing is holding up. It helped overshadow losses elsewhere in the market, including an 11.8% fall for Nasdaq, the exchange company that’s pushing more into technology. It said it would buy Adenza, a risk management and regulatory software provider, for $10.5 billion in cash and stock.
This week will also see the latest updates on inflation across the economy. On Tuesday, economists expect a report to show prices for consumers were 4.1% higher in May than a year earlier. That’s way above the Fed’s target of 2% inflation, but it would be down from 4.9% in April and a peak of more than 9% last June. Because prices were already much higher a year ago due to the worst inflation in 40 years, further increases in upcoming months may not appear quite so dramatic. Inflation could fall to 3.2% in June, and the next two months could see one of the biggest drops in inflation over a two-month period over the last 70 years, according to Jonathan Golub, chief US equity strategist at Credit Suisse.
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