NEW YORK (AP) 鈥� Microsoft and Meta Platforms drove Wall Street higher after delivering profits for the start of the year that were even bigger than analysts expected. The S&P 500 rose 0.6% Thursday and was back within 8.8% of its record set earlier this year. The Dow Jones Industrial Average added 0.2%, and the Nasdaq composite jumped 1.5%. Treasury yields swiveled in the bond market following some mixed reports on the economy. Yields initially sank after a report showed more U.S. workers applied for unemployment benefits last week than expected, but they later recovered following a better-than-feared update on U.S. manufacturing.
THIS IS A BREAKING NEWS UPDATE. AP鈥檚 earlier story follows below.
NEW YORK (AP) 鈥� and are driving Wall Street higher on Thursday after reporting profits for the start of the year that were even bigger than analysts expected.
The S&P 500 was up 1.2% in afternoon trading and heading for an , which would be its longest winning streak since August. The Dow Jones Industrial Average was up 253 points, or 0.6%, as of 1:17 p.m. Eastern time, and the Nasdaq composite was 2.2% higher.
Microsoft jumped 8.6% after the software giant said and artificial intelligence businesses drove its overall revenue up 13% from a year earlier.
Meta, the parent company of Facebook and Instagram, also in the latest quarter. It said AI tools helped boost its advertising revenue, and its stock climbed 5.1%.
The two are some of the most influential stocks within the S&P 500 and other indexes because of their massive sizes, but they weren't alone. , Carrier Global and a bevy of other companies also joined the stream of better-than-expected profit reports that have helped steady Wall Street over the last week. The S&P 500 is back to within 8.3% of its record set earlier this year, after briefly dropping .
Still, plenty of uncertainty remains about whether President Donald will force the economy into a recession. And even though companies have been reporting better profits for the first three months of the year than analysts expected, many CEOs are remaining cautious about the rest of the year.
in 2025, for example. It said it鈥檚 assuming it will feel a hit of $4 billion to $5 billion because of tariffs. GM鈥檚 stock nevertheless rose 0.1%. The automaker said it expects to offset at least 30% of the tariff impact.
fell 1% after reporting weaker revenue for the latest quarter than analysts expected, even though its profit was slightly above forecasts. An important underlying measure of performance at its U.S. restaurants had its worst decline since 2020, when COVID shuttered the global economy, and 惭肠顿辞苍补濒诲鈥檚 CEO Chris Kempczinski said consumers 鈥渁re grappling with uncertainty.鈥�
McDonald's joined and other restaurant chains that have seen customers get more cautious amid all the unknowns about the economy and inflation that鈥檚 still higher than many people would like.
The uncertainty has already shown up in surveys of consumers, which say pessimism is shooting higher about where the economy heading. On Thursday, a couple reports about the economy came in mixed, following up on several recent updates that have suggested it鈥檚 weaker than expected.
The first of the reports said last week than economists had forecast, setting the stage for a more comprehensive report on the job market arriving Friday.
But a later update said U.S. manufacturing activity was better last month than economists had feared, though it still contracted again.
The fear on Wall Street is for a possible worst-case scenario called 鈥渟tagflation,鈥� where the economy stagnates yet inflation remains high. It鈥檚 hated because the Federal Reserve has no good tools to fix both problems at the same time. If the Fed were to try to help one problem by adjusting interest rates, it would likely make the other worse.
Some encouraging news on inflation arrived Wednesday, when a report said that the measure of in March.
In the bond market, Treasury yields swiveled following Thursday's economic reports. The yield on the 10-year Treasury initially fell below 4.13% after the worse-than-expected update on joblessness. But it later trimmed its losses following the better-than-expected report on manufacturing and rallied to 4.21%. That's up from 4.17% late Wednesday.
In stock markets abroad, trading was closed in many countries for May Day, or international
Tokyo鈥檚 Nikkei 225 rose 1.1% after the Bank of Japan kept its benchmark interest rate unchanged, as many investors expected.
Hopes that Trump may eventually roll back some of his tariffs after reaching trade deals with other countries also helped to support markets.
A social media blog by China鈥檚 state broadcaster claimed that the Trump administration has been seeking contact with the world's second largest economy through multiple channels to start negotiations over tariffs.
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AP Writers Yuri Kageyama, Matt Ott and Didi Tang contributed.
Stan Choe, The Associated Press
