WASHINGTON (dpa-AFX) - With technology stocks moving sharply higher on the day, the Nasdaq showed a strong move back to the upside during trading on Wednesday, reaching a new record closing high.
The S&P 500 also climbed to a new record closing high, although the narrower Dow edged slightly lower after posting a modest gain on Tuesday.
While the Dow slipped 67.36 points or 0.1 percent to 49,693.20, the S&P 500 advanced 43.29 points or 0.6 percent to 7,444.25 and the Nasdaq shot up 314.14 points or 1.2 percent to 26,402.34.
The rally by the Nasdaq partly reflected substantial strength among semiconductor stocks, as reflected by the 2.6 percent surge by the Philadelphia Semiconductor Index.
Nvidia (NVDA) helped lead the sector higher, jumping by 2.3 percent after CEO Jensen Huang was a last-minute addition to President Donald Trump's trip to China to meet Chinese President Xi Jinping.
Meanwhile, the modest pullback by the Dow partly reflected a steep drop by shares of Salesforce (CRM), which tumbled by 3.2 percent. Notable declines by shares of IBM (IBM), Home Depot (HD) and Visa (V) also weighed on the blue chip index.
The mixed performance on Wall Street also came following the release of a Labor Department report showing producer prices in the U.S. shot up by much more than expected in the month of April.
The Labor Department said its producer price index for final demand jumped by 1.4 percent in April after climbing by an upwardly revised 0.7 percent in March. Economists had expected producer prices to rise by 0.5 percent.
The bigger than expected monthly increase by producer prices marked the largest advance since a 1.7 percent jump in March 2022.
The report also said the annual rate of growth by consumer prices soared to 6.0 percent in April from 4.3 percent in March, coming in well above economist estimates for a 4.9 percent surge and marking the fastest growth since a 6.4 percent spike in December 2022.
'The jump in input prices portends further increases for consumer prices in May,' said Nationwide Senior Economist Ben Ayers. 'We expect annual CPI inflation to move above 4.0 percent in May with energy prices still highly elevated more than two months into the Iranian conflict.'
He added, 'With inflation still trending higher, we expect the hawkish wing of the FOMC to advocate for an extended pause in interest rates even with incoming Fed Chair Kevin Warsh likely to prefer to lower rates over time.'
Following the data, interest rate-sensitive utilities and housing stocks showed significant moves to the downside on the day.
In overseas trading, stock markets across the Asia-Pacific region turned in a mixed performance on Wednesday. South Korea's Kospi surged by 2.6 percent, while Japan's Nikkei 225 Index advanced by 0.8 percent.
The major European markets also moved to the upside on the day. While the German DAX Index increased by 0.8 percent, the U.K.'s FTSE 100 Index climbed by 0.6 percent and the French CAC 40 Index rose by 0.4 percent.
In the bond market, treasuries extended the notable downward move seen over the two previous sessions. Subsequently, the yield on the benchmark ten-year note, which moves opposite of its price, rose 1.8 basis points to a ten-month closing high of 4.481 percent.
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