Stocks - Wall Street Jumps as Trade Hopes Outweigh Earnings Misses

Investing.com - Wall Street jumped after the opening bell, as investors were bolstered by news of progress in trade talks between the U.S. and China.

U.S. Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin discussed lifting some or all tariffs imposed on Chinese imports and suggested offering a rollback during trade discussions scheduled for Jan. 30, according to The Wall Street Journal.

The S&P 500 rose 16 points, or 0.64,% as of 9:32 AM ET (14:32 GMT), while the Dow increased 148 points, or 0.61%, and the tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite gained 41 points, or 0.59%.

Still, analysts warned that the jump could be shortlived if the news turns out to be false, as the Treasury Department did not confirm the report.

"Although, the Treasury didn't confirm (the report), the market has bought it for now and if it turns out to be a junk, the selloff would be intense," Naeem Aslam, chief market analyst at Think Markets UK in London, wrote in a note.

"To put things in perspective, the S&P 500 broke its 50-day moving average, a signal that bulls are back in the race."

In other news, oilfield services company Schlumberger (NYSE:SLB) jumped 5.4% after its fourth quarter revenue topped forecasts, while Boeing (NYSE:BA) rose 1.09% and semiconductor company Micron (NASDAQ:MU) gained 1.45%.

Facebook (NASDAQ:FB) rose 0.61%, while Apple (NASDAQ:AAPL) inched up 0.52%.

Tesla (NASDAQ:TSLA) slipped 8.25% after Chief Executive Elon Musk said he was cutting the company’s workforce by 7% in order to lower operating costs. Netflix (NASDAQ:NFLX) fell 3% after its quarterly revenue missed estimates and it warned on first-quarter profit.

In commodities, gold futures fell 0.82% to $1,281.65 a troy ounce and crude oil increased 0.65% to $52.41 a barrel. The U.S. dollar index, which measures the greenback against a basket of six major currencies, rose 0.16% to 95.863.

-- Reuters contributed to this report.

Related Articles

Mexico stocks lower at close of trade; S&P/BMV IPC down 0.28%

Stocks - Dow Shakes Off Slide in Energy as IBM, United Tech Jump

Canada stocks lower at close of trade; S&P/TSX Composite down 0.21%