Stocks climbed higher Wednesday as investors digested fresh economic data and look ahead toward's the release of the Federal Reserve's preferred inflation gauge and August's jobs report later this week. The Dow Jones Industrial Average added about 40 points, while the S&P 500 and Nasdaq Composite rose roughly 0.4% and 0.5%, respectively.
Here's how the market settled on Thursday:
S&P 500 Index (NYSE: SPY): +0.38% or +17.24 points to 4,514.87
Dow Jones Industrial Average (NYSE: DIA): +0.11% or +37.57 points to 34,890.24
Nasdaq Composite Index (NASDAQ: QQQ): +0.54% or +75.55 points to 14,019.31
Driving the session's moves, ADP's private payrolls report showed slower-than-expected job growth in August, providing another sign that the strong labor market is beginning to cool in response to higher interest rates. U.S. private employers added 177,000 jobs in August, far below July's revised print of 371,000.
"This month's numbers are consistent with the pace of job creation before the pandemic," said Nela Richardson, chief economist at ADP, in a press release. "After two years of exceptional gains tied to the recovery, we're moving toward more sustainable growth in pay and employment as the economic effects of the pandemic recede."
ADP's report comes before the Labor Department's "official" jobs report due out Friday morning. Economists expect non-farm payrolls to grow by 170,000 in August, near on par with ADP's report.
In other economic news, U.S. second-quarter GDP was revised lower on Wednesday, expanding by an estimated 2.1% annual clip -- slightly below the preliminary 2.4% estimate.
On the earnings front, HP (NYSE: HPQ) shares fell after the company released disappointing fiscal third-quarter revenue. Still, analysts at Bernstein wrote in a note Wednesday that HP's PC revenues are expected to improve.
"Weak printer shipments may impact supplies growth in the medium term, HPQ's margins remain above pre-pandemic levels, and we worry about the structural health of the printing business and its ability to grow over time," the analysts wrote in a note, quoted by CNBC.
In single-stock news, Google (NASDAQ: GOOGL) announced its Pixel launch event will be held on Oct. 4, where it is expected to unveil the new Pixel 8 and Pixel 8 Pro. "Big fall launches are stressful, but Pixel helps these Best Phones Forever stay cool as cucumbers. The w8 is almost over. Rest up for Made By Google on October 4th," Google posted on Meta Platform's (NASDAQ: META) Threads.
Lyft (NASDAQ: LYFT) was in the news after a new regulatory filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission disclosed that Director Prashant Aggarwal purchased nearly 100,000 shares of the ride-hailing company. The stock rose more than 8% on Wednesday.
For Thursday, market participants will react to July's personal consumption expenditures index, which is one of the Fed's preferred inflation gauges, as well as earnings reports from companies including Salesforce (NYSE: CRM), CrowdStrike (NASDAQ: CRWD), Chewy (NYSE: CHWY) and Dollar General (NYSE: DG).