Investing.com -- The S&P 500 closed at a record high Tuesday as U.S. stocks took a hotter-than-expected inflation report in stride, underpinned by fresh bullish bets in tech.
At 16:00 ET (20:20 GMT), the benchmark S&P 500 climbed 1.1% to record of 5,173.97, the tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite gained 1.5%, and the blue-chip Dow Jones Industrial Average jumped 235 points, or 0.6%.
Inflation comes in hot, again
The core gauge came in at 0.4%, which strips out volatile items like food and fuel, matching the prior month and marginally hotter than expectations of 0.3%, taking the year-on-year pace to 3.8% from 3.9%, but that was still slightly above projections of 3.7%.
The hotter-than-expected pace of inflation will be “one factor delaying the decision to start cutting rates to June this year,” Morgan Stanley said in a note.
Treasury yields moved higher on the prospect of higher for longer interest rate path, but that did little to stem bullish bets on tech, led by Oracle and a rebound in Nvidia.
Oracle Corporation (NYSE:ORCL) surged nearly 12% after reporting stronger-than-expected quarterly earnings on increased demand for its AI offerings.
The cloud computing firm said it will make a joint announcement with AI darling Nvidia (NASDAQ:NVDA) this week, citing expectations of increased AI-led demand for cloud infrastructure.
NVIDIA Corporation (NASDAQ:NVDA) jumped more than 7%, lifting the broader chip sector more than 3% higher, while megacap tech including Alphabet Inc Class A (NASDAQ:GOOGL), Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ:MSFT) and Meta Platforms Inc (NASDAQ:META) were also in the ascendency.
Boeing, Southwest weigh on industrials
Industrials, however, lagged the broader market move higher, weighed down by slump in airline stocks and a more than 4% slump in Boeing Co (NYSE:BA) after the aircraft maker reportedly failed 33 out of 89 audits during Federal Air Aviation examination.
The investigation was launched after an air panel blew off an Alaska Airlines Boeing 737 Max plane mid-flight.
Southwest Airlines Company (NYSE:LUV), down nearly 15%, led the move in airline stocks lower after cutting its first-quarter guidance on capacity, and warning that it was reevaluating full-year outlook amid delays of aircraft delivery from Boeing.
American Airlines Group (NASDAQ:AAL) fell more than 4% after warning of a bigger loss this year owing to higher fuel costs.
3M Company (NYSE:MMM), up nearly 5%, however helped stem losses in industrials the maker of Post-it notes and Scotch tape said it has appointed William Brown as chief executive officer.
Microstrategy shines despite bitcoin breather
On the crypto front, meanwhile, bitcoin eased from eased record high notched a day earlier falling 3% as investors appeared to take some profit on the crypto’s record run.
Crypto-related stock MicroStrategy Incorporated (NASDAQ:MSTR), however, climbed more than 7% after Canaccord Genuity hiked its price target on the stock to $1,810 from $975, saying the company wasn’t “resting on its laurels” as the software maker continues to bolster its bitcoin holdings.
(Scott Kanowsky, Ambar Warrick contributed to this report.)