Stocks Rebound As US Economy Flexes Muscles, Small Caps Rally, Gold Falls: What's Driving Markets Thursday?

Wall Street strongly rebounded Thursday after Wednesday’s slump, driven by stronger-than-expected economic growth in the last quarter, countering concerns of a slowdown.

The U.S. economy posted a notable 2.8% real growth in the second quarter, doubling the first quarter’s pace and exceeding the 2% growth estimate.

Adding to the positive outlook, the Personal Consumption Expenditure (PCE) price index showed cooling price pressures, dropping from 3.4% to 2.6%, signaling progress toward the 2% target.

At midday, major U.S. averages traded positively, with all eleven sectors of the S&P 500 posting gains. The S&P 500 index was up 1%, and the Dow gained a robust 1.3%. The tech-heavy Nasdaq 100 inched 0.9% higher, while small caps, tracked by the iShares Russell 2000 ETF IWM, rallied 2.4%.

Treasury yields fell significantly, with the 30-year yield down 6 basis points to 4.48%, boosting the iShares 20+ Year Treasury Bond ETF TLT by 1.8%.

Gold fell 1.6%, likely impacted by the rebound in riskier assets, silver plummeted 3.7%, while oil prices rose 0.7% to $77.80.

Bitcoin BTC/USD fell 1% to $64,750, marking its fourth straight session of losses.

Thursday’s Performance In Major US Indices, ETFs

Major Indices	Price	1-day %chg
Russell 2000	2,252.16	2.4%
Dow Jones	40,361.96	1.3%
S&P 500	5,480.26	1.0%
Nasdaq 100	19,202.70	0.9%

According to Benzinga Pro data:

• The SPDR S&P 500 ETF Trust SPY was 0.7% higher to $545.24.
• The SPDR Dow Jones Industrial Average DIA rose 1.1% to $403.20.
• The tech-heavy Invesco QQQ Trust (ARCA: QQQ) rose 0.5% to $465.53.
• Sector-wise, the Industrials Select Sector SPDR Fund XLI outperformed, up by 1.9%, while the Communication Services Select Sector SPDR Fund XLC and the Utilities Select Sector SPDR Fund XLU lagged, both up 0.6%.

Wednesday’s Stock Movers

Stocks moving on earnings were:

• Chipotle Mexican Grill, Inc. CMG, down 2%.
• Edwards Lifesciences Corporation EW down over 29%.
• Ford Motor Co. F down over 16%.
• International Business Machines Corporation IBM up nearly 6%.
• Las Vegas Sands Corp. LVS down over 1%.
• ServiceNow, Inc. NOW ORLY), up over 15%.
• Kla Corp. KLAC up 3.2%.
• Teradyne Inc. TER down over 11%.
• Newmont Corp. NEM down nearly 3%.
• STMicroelectronics N.V. down over 11%.
• O’Reilly Automotive, Inc. ORLY up over 4%.
• AbbVie Inc. ABBV up nearly 4%.
• American Airlines Group Inc. AAL up over 6%.
• AstraZeneca PLC AZN down 2.8%.
• Comcast Corporation CMCSA up 1.9%.
• Dow Inc. DOW down 0.6%.
• Hasbro, Inc. HAS up 3.8%.
• Honeywell International Inc. HON down over 4%.
• Sanofi SNY up 3.9%
• Southwest Airlines Co. LUV up 6.8%
• RTX Corp. RTX up over 8%.
• Union Pacific Corporation UNP up 0.1%.
• Valero Energy Corp. VLO.
• Xerox Holdings Corporation XRX down over 7%.

Those reporting after the close include: SkyWest, Inc. SKYW, Juniper Networks, Inc. JNPR, Deckers Outdoor Corporation DECK, Boyd Gaming Corporation BYD, BJ’s Restaurants, Inc. BJRI and VeriSign, Inc. VRSN.

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Image created using artificial intelligence via Midjourney.