NEW YORK, NEW YORK – JANUARY 22: Traders work on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange during afternoon trading on January 22, 2024 in New York City. The Dow Jones and S&P both hit all time highs with the Dow Jones closing over 38,000 points for the first time ever as stocks continue to rise.
(Photo by Michael M. Santiago/Getty Images)
Michael M. Santiago | Getty Images News | Getty Images
The S&P 500 rose Wednesday as Netflix led a broader rally among technology names, pushing the broader market to new heights.
The benchmark S&P 500 climbed 0.3%, on track to clinch a new all-time closing record. The technology-heavy Nasdaq Composite advanced 0.6%. The Dow Jones Industrial Average traded 13 points lower, sitting near flat.
Netflix shares surged nearly 12% after the streamer said its total subscriber count hit an all-time high of 260.8 million. Revenue topped analysts’ estimates, as did current-quarter earnings guidance.
The earnings report “is a pretty decent tailwind,” said Charlie Ripley, senior strategist at Allianz Investment Management. More broadly, “people thought things were fairly balanced, or maybe even positioning for more downside risks, as growth in the economy or activity in the economy continues to decline. But what we’ve kind of seen is things have been more resilient.”
Elsewhere, Microsoft rose more than 1%, sending its market value briefly higher than $3 trillion for the first time. Meta advanced nearly 2%, bringing the Facebook parent’s market cap above $1 trillion.
Both gains added to mega-cap tech’s strong performance in 2024, which have propelled the S&P 500 to record highs and confirmed a new bull market. Communication services and information technology stocks boosted the broad index on Wednesday.
Beyond technology, AT&T slipped more than 3% on lower-than-expected earnings. Dupont De Nemours tumbled more than 13% after preannouncing weak fourth-quarter results and issuing disappointing first-quarter guidance.
Earnings reports will remain a focus of traders, with Tesla, Las Vegas Sands and IBM due after the bell. Of the more than 16% of S&P 500 companies that have reported quarterly financials thus far in the earnings season, over 71% have surpassed Wall Street expectations, according to FactSet.
“The markets are very bullish right now,” said Larry Tentarelli, founder of the Blue Chip Daily Trend Report. And “the key thing right now is the reaction to earnings.”
