Investing.com – Wall Street moved higher on Tuesday, looking past a terrorist attack in the U.K. and focusing on details of U.S. President Donald Trump’s plans for the country’s budget and developments surrounding the tax reform plan.
At 12:12PM ET (16:12GMT), the Dow Jones gained 49 points, or 0.23%, the S&P 500 rose 7 points, or 0.28%, while the Nasdaq Composite traded up 9 points, or 0.15%.
European markets appeared to take the deadly suicide bombing at the end of an Ariana Grande concert in Manchester in stride.
Responsibility for the attack, that killed 22 people and injured more than 50, was later claimed by ISIS.
Market impact was initially noted in the pound, as sterling traded lower against the yen, euro and dollar, only to recover later in the session.
European equities showed resilience, ending their session in the black on Tuesday with the exception of London’s FTSE 100 that closed down 0.1%.
With President Trump traveling overseas in a series of meetings with leaders from the Middle East and Europe, politics caused few ripples for markets on Tuesday.
Market players perused Trump’s budget proposal that would seek to slash social welfare spending in order to balance the nation’s expenses, but it’s presentation appeared to be taken as a non-event as Congress has the final word over federal purse strings.
U.S. Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin stated that difficult decisions had been made in the 2018 White House budget, while also admitting that the administration was working closely with both the House and the Senate on tax reform in the hopes that it could get done by the end of the year, dashing any remaining hopes that it could be completed by August.
Market players also looked past mixed U.S. economic data released on Tuesday.
U.S. new home sales tumbled by 11.4% in April, missing consensus expectations, though some investors pointed to the fact that the decline came on the back of a 9 ½ year high reached in the prior month.
Business activity also showed a mixed reading on Tuesday, as preliminary May figures from Markit showed manufacturing unexpectedly slipping. The overall composite read edged forward however thanks to a surprise increase in service sector activity.
In big moves on earnings, AutoZone (NYSE:AZO) tumbled more than 8% after the auto parts retailer missed expectations.
On the upside, Take-Two (NASDAQ:TTWO) jumped nearly 5% as the video game maker provided a guidance that appeared to be not as bad as some feared. Specifically, the maker of Grand Theft Auto forecast revenue of $240 to $290 million for the quarter ending June 30, compared to expectations of $260.4 million.
Meanwhile, oil prices moved higher during mid-day North American trade on Tuesday on growing expectations that OPEC members will extend supply cuts for a prolonged period when they meet on Thursday.
Investors looked ahead to weekly data from the U.S. on stockpiles of crude and refined products. Industry group the American Petroleum Institute is due to release its weekly report at 4:30PM ET (20:30GMT) later on Tuesday.
U.S. crude futures gained 0.37% to $51.32 by 12:14PM ET (16:14GMT), while Brent oil rose 0.28% to $54.02.