Stocks climbed on Friday to close at a fresh record, boosted by hopes of a peace deal with Iran and expectations that spending on artificial intelligence will continue propelling corporate earnings growth. The S&P 500 Index closed 0.2% higher, capping off its ninth-straight week of gains, a streak matched just four times since 1985. The tech-heavy Nasdaq 100 Index rose 0.4% while the Dow Jones Industrial Average climbed 0.7%.
Crude oil prices dropped again after President Donald Trump said he's making a "final determination" on a preliminary deal to extend a ceasefire with Iran, although mixed messages from both sides over when an agreement might be struck continued to confuse the outlook for a breakthrough.
"Stocks were propelled higher on Friday by the same two forces that have been driving them for the last couple of months: great earnings and anticipation of an Iran deal," said Vital Knowledge founder Adam Crisafulli. Dell Technologies Inc. shares soared almost 30% after the hardware maker raised its sales outlook well above Wall Street's consensus view, thanks in large part to $60 billion in expected revenue from AI servers.
Those gains helped boost a handful of peers, including Hewlett Packard Enterprise and Super Micro Computer.
"This appears to be the type of market where good news is never fully priced in, and a 50% year-over-year increase in revenues is not deemed cyclical," said Mike O'Rourke, chief market strategist at JonesTrading Institutional Investor Services LLC, of the Dell release. The company's shares have more than tripled this year.
Software stocks charged higher, with Palantir Technologies Inc. shares gaining 9.2% and Microsoft Corp. rising 5.5%.
A handful of Federal Reserve officials also provided optimistic views of the economy and the interest rate path. San Francisco Fed President Mary Daly said the central bank's rate policy is "in a good place" and she's "cautiously optimistic" about the economy. Minneapolis Fed President Neel Kashkari said it's too early to conclude that interest rates need to rise.
Traders also parsed a narrowing of the US merchandise-trade deficit as exports rose. Retail inventories, meanwhile, rose slightly faster than expected. Other notable single-stock movers Friday include Costco, which slipped after the wholesaler's moderating membership growth raised concerns on Wall Street. Gap shares fell after the company's Old Navy brand weighed on its full-year outlook.
(This story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
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