Stocks rose on Thursday, recovering from the previous session's sell-off, as markets shook off the Federal Reserve's hawkish stance towards interest rates and looked ahead towards another batch of tech earnings due after closing bell. The Dow Jones Industrial Average climbed nearly 370 points, while the S&P 500 Index and Nasdaq Composite added about 1.3% each.
Here's how the market settled on Thursday:
S&P 500 Index (NYSE: SPY): +1.25% or +60.54 points to 4,906.19
Dow Jones Industrial Average (NYSE: DIA): +0.97% or +369.54 points to 38,519.84
Nasdaq Composite Index (NASDAQ: QQQ): +1.30% or +197.63 points to 15,361.64
On the Earnings Front: Qualcomm (NASDAQ: QCOM) reported fiscal first-quarter results late Wednesday that topped expectations, benefiting from a 16% year-over-year sales increase of handset chips. For its current quarter, Qualcomm expects adjusted earnings of between $1.73 and $1.93 per share on revenue of $8.9 billion to $9.7 billion.
Honeywell (NYSE: HON) shares fell on Thursday after the industrial bellwether posted mixed fourth-quarter results. For its full year 2024, Honeywell expects earnings per share in the range of $9.80 to $10.10 alongside revenue of $38.10 billion to $38.90 billion.
Nextracker (NASDAQ: NXT) stock rose on Thursday after the solar panel parts manufacturer raised its full year revenue guidance to up fro $2.475 billion from $2.4 billion previously. The company also raised its adjusted earnings forecast to $2.75 per share at the top of the range, compare to $2.15 previously.
In Economic News: The Bureau of Labor Statistics reported Thursday that productivity, or a measurement of worker output, rose 3.2% in the fourth quarter -- topping estimates -- while the unit labor costs, which measures the differences between worker pay and productivity, rose just 0.5% -- coming below estimates.
Weekly unemployment claims topped estimates on Thursday, totaing 224,000 for the week ended Jan. 27, the Labor Department reported. Continuing jobless claims also rose by 70,000 over the previous week to total about 1.9 million. Meanwhile, the U.S. manufacturing sector continued to contract in January, with the ISM Manufacturing Index increasing 2 points from December to 49.1 on Thursday, with any reading below 50 representing contraction. The sector has contracted for 15 consecutive months.
For Friday: All eyes will be on the Labor Department's "official" jobs report for January, as well as earnings reports from companies including Apple (NASDAQ: AAPL), Amazon (NASDAQ: AMZN) and Meta Platforms (NASDAQ: META).