Investing.com – Late buying gave stocks a decent finish on Thursday after getting crushed in the last two days.
The S&P 500 advanced 0.8%. The Dow Jones industrials added 0.47%, and the Nasdaq Composite won a relatively strong 1.12% gain. The gains were welcome after the Dow lost 838 points in the prior two days, with the S&P 500 giving up 89 points and the Nasdaq 214.
The S&P 500 and Dow finished just below their highs of the day. The Nasdaq closed at its high.
The upside of the rally was heavy buying in the last half hour of the day. The Dow moved up more than 100 points to finish with a 122-point gain.
The rally was powered by big technology stocks, including Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT), Facebook (NASDAQ:FB) Apple (NASDAQ:AAPL), Amazon.com (NASDAQ:AMZN) and Google parent Alphabet (NASDAQ:GOOGL).
The five combined to contribute nearly 40% of the Nasdaq 100 index's gain of nearly 88 points.
In addition, Costco Wholesale (NASDAQ:COST), due to report earnings after the close, was up 1.4%. But the shares were 1.1% lower after hours after the company reported lower-than-expected earnings per share, and sales growth on a comparable-store basis was lower than expected.
Boeing (NYSE:BA), McDonald’s (NYSE:MCD), Apple, Visa (NYSE:V) and Microsoft were responsible for 101 points of the Dow's 122-point gain.
The market seemed to weather weakness in Tesla (NASDAQ:TSLA), whose September deliveries missed expectations.
As welcome as Thursday's rally was, Friday's jobs report from the Labor Department could scuttle things quickly if the numbers are weak. Solid job growth will probably set off a big day.
Uncertainty in the market came early in the day from the Institute for Supply Management, whose September report for the non-manufacturing economy showed the slowest growth in three years.
The ISM report set off a selloff, with the Dow down as many as 335 points before recovering in a big way. The report also expanded speculation that the Federal Reserve will cut its key rate at its meeting at the end of October. Investing.com's Fed Rate Monitor Tool gives a rate cut a 91% chance of happening.
Oil prices were mostly flat, but interest rates dropped. The 10-Year Treasury yield fell to 1.536% from Wednesday's 1.597% sought safety. Safety also helped gold move higher. Gold futures in New York were up $5.90 an ounce to $1,509.80 an ounce.
S&P 500 leaders included Lamb Weston Holdings (NYSE:LW), one of the biggest french-fry processors, market platform operator MarketAxesss Holdings and chipmaker Nvidia (NASDAQ:NVDA).
Wine merchant Constellation Brands (NYSE:STZ), Charles Schwab (NYSE:SCHW) and Delta Air Lines (NYSE:DAL) were among the weakest S&P 500 stocks.