S&P 500 closes higher to secure strongest Q1 since 2019
first quarter in five years, as investors digested the latest batch of economic data while looking towards the next inflation reading.
Each of the three main U.S. indexes recorded solid quarterly gains, led by a climb of 10.16% for the S&P 500, aided by optimism over artificial intelligence (AI) related stocks and expectations the U.S. Federal Reserve will begin to cut interest rates this year.
The blue-chip Dow sits less than 1% away from breaching the 40,000 level for the first time.
Data on Thursday showed the U.S. economy grew faster than previously estimated in the fourth quarter, partly due to strong consumer spending, while a separate report showed initial jobless claims indicated the labor market remains on solid footing.
«The economy is in pretty good shape, the consumer is in pretty good shape and still spending, unemployment is still on the low side, and there continues to be pockets where the economy is thriving… So there's money that is wanting to be spent in a variety of different ways,» said George Young, portfolio manager at Villere & Company in New Orleans.
«And then you've got that carrot that the Fed's kind of holding out there saying, we may just be lowering and we may just be lowering, and everybody's trying to parse their words.»
While U.S. equity markets will be closed for the Good Friday holiday, the focus will be on the release of the Personal Consumption Expenditures Price Index (PCE), the Fed's preferred inflation gauge, for clues on the timing and size of rate cuts this year from
