Two of the major US stock indexes opened higher on Thursday as Nvidia (NVDA) continued a record-breaking surge that has catapulted it to the title of world’s most valuable public company.
The S&P 500 (^GSPC) gained roughly 0.4%, after the index closed Tuesday’s session by securing its 31st record close of the year. The tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite (^IXIC) rose about 0.3% while the Dow Jones Industrial Average (^DJI) dipped slightly.
After a holiday break on Wednesday, Wall Street looked set to continue its winning ways in 2024. Stocks’ growth story this year has been largely driven by the excitement around AI’s potential, and no company has captured the collective attention like Nvidia. Its stock was up more than 2% in early trading. Shares are up more than 170% so far this year.
On Tuesday, Nvidia completed a remarkably quick surge to usurp Microsoft (MSFT) as the most valuable company in the world — just two weeks after it dethroned Apple (AAPL) as the No. 2 most valuable company. Its rise to the top has come so fast, Yahoo Finance’s Jared Blikre writes, that some more passive investors haven’t been able to keep up.
Elsewhere on Thursday, global central banks were in focus as the Swiss National Bank cut rates for the second time this year. The Bank of England kept its benchmark rate at a 16-year high, but signals pointed to a rate cut in the summer.
In the US, meanwhile, most traders continue to bet on a Fed cut by September, according to the CME FedWatch tool. The biggest piece of economic data came in the form of weekly jobless claims, which showed a dip of 5,000 to 238,000 last week vs. a consensus expectation of 235,000.
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