Stocks Moderately Higher
This article is from the archive of The New York Sun before the launch of its new website in 2022. The Sun has neither altered nor updated such articles but will seek to correct any errors, mis-categorizations or other problems introduced during transfer.
NEW YORK (AP) – Wall Street opened moderately higher Thursday after economic readings found that while worker productivity slowed in the first quarter, so did wages, easing some concerns about inflation.
The rise in stocks comes a day after Wall Street pushed higher and sent the Dow Jones industrials above 13,200 for the first time and the Standard & Poor’s 500 index neared the psychologically important 1,500 mark.
The Labor Department said Thursday that productivity – the amount of output per hour of work – increased at an annual rate of 1.7 percent in the first quarter, less than an increase of 2.1 percent seen in the fourth quarter. Wages slowed even more sharply, however; unit labor costs rose at a 0.6 percent rate. In the fourth quarter, the increase had been 6.2 percent, fueled in part by year-end bonuses.
In the first minutes of trading, the Dow Jones industrial average rose 8.94, or 0.07 percent, to 13,220.82. The blue chip index has hit 17 record closes since the start of the year and 39 since the beginning of October, its latest coming Wednesday.
The Standard & Poor’s 500 index rose 2.35, or 0.16 percent, to 1,498.27. Wall Street, which often regards the S&P 500, rather than the Dow, as the benchmark to beat, has been waiting for the index to move back above 1,500; the S&P 500 hasn’t closed above that level since September 2000. The 1,500 level puts the closing high of 1,527.46 reached March 24, 2000, within investors’ sights.
The Nasdaq composite index Thursday rose 1.09, or 0.04 percent, to 2,558.93.
Bonds fell following the economic data; the yield on the benchmark 10-year Treasury note rose to 4.66 percent from 4.65 percent late Thursday.
The dollar was mixed against other major currencies, while gold prices fell.
Advancing issues outnumbered decliners by about 3 to 2 on the New York Stock Exchange, where volume came to 101.5 million shares.
The Russell 2000 index of smaller companies fell 0.24, or 0.03 percent, to 828.22.
Overseas, markets in Japan were closed for a holiday. Britain’s FTSE 100 rose 0.70 percent, Germany’s DAX index gained 0.03 percent, and France’s CAC-40 rose 0.27 percent.
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