© Reuters.
Investing.com — U.S. stocks opened broadly higher on Tuesday, as investors reacted to a faster-than-anticipated U.S. inflation reading.
The annualized reading of the closely-watched increased by 3.2% last month, quicker than estimates that it would remain at a pace of 3.1% notched in January. The year-on-year , which strips out volatile items like food and fuel, cooled to 3.8% from 3.9%, but was still slightly above projections of 3.7%.
Month-on-month, the rose by 0.4% in February, in line with expectations and faster than the 0.3% uptick in January. The gauge came in at 0.4%, matching the prior month and marginally hotter than expectations of 0.3%.
The data pointed to possibly sticky inflationary pressures that could complicate the timing of potential Federal Reserve interest rate cuts this year. Several Fed officials, chiefly Chair Jerome Powell, have warned that the central bank’s plans for reductions in 2024 will be largely dictated by the path of inflation.
The benchmark S&P 500 had risen 0.2%, the tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite had added 0.2%, and the blue-chip Dow Jones Industrial Average had dipped by 0.1% by 09:38 ET (13:38 GMT).
Oracle (NYSE:) was one of the best performers in early dealmaking, surging nearly 13% after clocking stronger-than-expected quarterly earnings on increased demand for its AI offerings.
The cloud computing firm said it will make a joint announcement with AI darling Nvidia (NASDAQ:) this week, citing expectations of increased demand for cloud infrastructure from the growing AI industry.
Gains in Oracle spilled over into other tech heavyweights in extended trade, given that AI hype has been a key driver of stock gains in recent months. Nvidia rose 1.3%, while Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ:) and Alphabet Inc (NASDAQ:) added 0.4% and 0.6%, respectively.
But barring Oracle, most major tech stocks were nursing losses over the prior two sessions, as investors locked in recent profits in the sector ahead of more cues on U.S. interest rates.
The fell 0.1% to 5,117.94 points on Monday, while the fell 0.4% to 16,019.27 points. The closed up 0.1% at 38,769.66 points.
