STORY: Wall Street hit a milestone on Tuesday as all three major stock indexes closed at record highs, with the Dow adding more than four-tenths of a percent, the S&P 500 gaining over a quarter of a percent and the Nasdaq climbing more than a third of a percent.
Data released on Tuesday showed U.S. employers added nearly a million fewer jobs in the 12 months through March than previously estimated.
The large downward revision supported expectations the Federal Reserve will soon cut interest rates, but by how much, wondered Kevin Mahn, chief investment officer at Hennion & Walsh Asset Management.
“If they cut by 25 basis points… or do they cut by 50 basis points? If they cut by 50 basis points, are they going to admit that they were wrong and they are late to the party? And if they do only cut by 25 basis points, what are they going to signal about the economy going forward, particularly as it relates to the jobs market? Are they more concerned with the jobs market than they are with inflation?”
Stocks on the move Tuesday included Apple, which fell one-and-a-half percent after the company unveiled new iPhones that failed to excite investors.
Shares of AI infrastructure firm Nebius soared almost 50% after the company signed a $17.4 billion deal with Microsoft. Rival CoreWeave jumped 7%.
And shares of UnitedHealth jumped more than eight-and-a-half percent after the insurer said it expects enrollment in top-rated Medicare plans to be in line with its expectations, which could mean bigger payments from the government to the company.
