US stocks have finished solidly higher following a mixed bag of economic data and earnings reports, snapping a five-day losing streak for the Dow Jones Industrial Average.
The Dow advanced rose 90.68 points (0.57 per cent) to 15,928.56.
The broad-based S&P 500 jumped 10.94 (0.61 per cent) to 1,792.50, while the tech-rich Nasdaq Composite Index tacked on 14.35 (0.35 per cent) at 4,097.96.
The market had been primed for a rally after significant losses on Thursday and Friday and a more modest decline Monday, said Mace Blicksilver, director at Marblehead Asset Management.
“The market’s been so weak that it’s entitled to a rally-back kind of day,” Blicksilver said.
Blicksilver rated Tuesday’s Conference Board report showing rising consumer confidence “quite good,” but said it was countered by a “terrible” report on durable goods – US orders sank 4.3 per cent in December against expectations of a rise.
Earnings reports were also mixed, with a disappointing outlook from Apple offset by strong results from Pfizer and others.
Despite the equity rebound, the market is still in a “rocky” phase and could see further volatility this week and afterward, Blicksilver said.
Financial stocks rose, including Citigroup (+1.6 per cent) and Bank of America (+2.6 per cent).
Other winners included technology stocks that gained disproportionately in the 2013 stock rally, including Netflix (+6.7 per cent), Facebook (+3.0 per cent) and Tesla Motors (+5.2 per cent).
Apple tumbled 8.0 per cent after projecting lower revenues in the upcoming quarter despite a major iPhone launch in China. Activist investor Carl Icahn, who has been pressing for a big share buyback, announced that he purchased another $US500 million in Apple stock.
Dow component Pfizer shot up 2.6 per cent after quarterly earnings bested expectations by four cents at 56 cents per share.
Another Dow component, DuPont, fell 1.1 per cent despite outperforming earnings forecasts and unveiling a $US5 billion share buyback program.
Google rose 2.0 per cent after unveiling plan to make its eyewear Google Glass available under prescription and potentially with insurance reimbursement. The product is currently in the test phase, but Google plans a commercial launch this year.
Bond prices rose. The yield on the 10-year US Treasury fell to 2.75 per cent from 2.77 per cent on Monday, while the 30-year slipped to 3.67 per cent from 3.68 per cent. Bond prices and yields move inversely.
