Stock Market Today: Wall Street Roars Back — S&P 500 Jumps 2.35% to 7,549.94, Dow Adds 1,104 on the Eve of CPI
Monday's close erased most of last week's damage in one session: the S&P 500 rose 173.08 points to 7,549.94, the Dow added 1,104.02 to 52,389.75 and the Nasdaq jumped 2.74% to 25,253.14, carried by cheaper oil and a chip rebound. Tuesday's October CPI at 8:30 a.m. is the rally's first real test.
Wall Street spent Monday taking back what last week took away. The S&P 500 closed at 7,549.94, up 173.08 points or 2.35 percent — its second straight gain — the Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 1,104.02 points, or 2.15 percent, to 52,389.75, and the Nasdaq Composite outran both, up 673.71 points or 2.74 percent to 25,253.14, according to the Associated Press final closing scoreboard. For a market that came into the week nursing the S&P tech sector's worst stretch in months, it was the kind of broad, everything-up session that resets a trading desk's mood by the closing bell.
The fuel was energy — or rather, less of it. Oil slid hard on the day, with December West Texas Intermediate down about 4.25 percent to $86.97 a barrel and Brent down 5.60 percent to $92.81 in the close files, a drop traders read as relief for both consumers and the inflation picture. Chip stocks rebounded from Thursday's sell-off and led the Nasdaq, with one conspicuous exception: Nvidia fell 4.27 percent to $178.67, lagging the tape it usually leads as the board's independent investigation into its chief executive continued to hang over the stock — a story this desk has been following since the board's probe was first reported. Bond traders, notably, did not join the party: the 10-year Treasury yield ended essentially flat at 4.864 percent, so Monday's rally was not a bet on cheaper money.
The New York Fed's October survey, released Monday, gave the rally a steady backdrop: households' median one-year inflation expectations held unchanged at 3.9 percent, with the three-year reading at 3.3 percent and the five-year at 3.0 percent — expectations that are elevated but, for one more month, not rising.
All of it is prologue. The Bureau of Labor Statistics releases October's consumer price index Tuesday at 8:30 a.m. Eastern, with economists expecting a 0.3 percent monthly rise and 0.2 percent for core prices. It is the last full inflation read before the Federal Reserve's December meeting, and it lands on a market that has just bet heavily on calm: a hotter print would test Monday's gains within minutes of the open, and a cooler one would hand the rally a second day. Wall Street has had its say for Monday. Tuesday morning, the CPI gets the next word.
