Investing.com - Stocks were mostly higher Thursday a day after recession fears caused one of the year's worst selloffs.
Better-than-expected earnings from Walmart (NYSE:WMT) and a decent gain for Boeing (NYSE:BA) helped improve traders' moods.
The S&P 500 rose 0.29%. The Dow Jones industrials added 0.39%. But the Nasdaq Composite suffered a small loss, mostly because of weakness in Cisco Systems (NASDAQ:CSCO), Netflix (NASDAQ:NFLX), Apple (NASDAQ:AAPL) and Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT).
The market's performance was hardly an all-clear signal for the major averages.
The Dow gained about 100 points, but that was just 12% of the 800-point loss the index suffered on Wednesday, its worst one-day loss on the year and worst since Oct. 10, 2018. Plus, 95 points of the gain were due to Boeing (NYSE:BA) and Walmart (NYSE:WMT) alone.
In addition, about half of the stocks in the Nasdaq 100 were lowe,r with Cisco (NASDAQ:CSCO) the worst performer, with an 8.6% loss after guidance in Wednesday's earnings report disappointed investors.
Meanwhile, traditional retailers were hit hard again with Macy’s (NYSE:M) down 3.8%, Gap (NYSE:GPS) down 7.1%, and Nordstrom (NYSE:JWN) off 2.6%.
General Electric (NYSE:GE) shares suffered an 11.3% loss to $8.01 -- and that wasn't even a 52-week low.
The stock slumped after Harry Markopolos, the forensic accountant famed for uncovering the Bernard Madoff scam, accused the company of accounting fraud in its handling of legacy long-term care insurance policies. The company dismissed Markopolos' claims as without merit and accused Markopolos of market manipulation. GE's percentage loss was its biggest since 2008.
With Thursday's close, the S&P 500 is off 5.9% from its late-July peak, but still up 13.6% for the year. The Dow is down 6.6% from the July high and ahead 9.7% in 2019, while the Nasdaq's decline from its peak stood at 6.9%. It ended the day up 17% for all of 2019.
A bright spot after hours was a 5.3% gain for shares of Nvidia (NASDAQ:NVDA) after the graphics-chip maker reporter earnings and revenue that beat estimates.
Oil prices were lower, with WTI crude falling 76 cents to $54.47 a barrel. Brent oil futures were off $1.41 to $58.07. Gold futures continued to climb, with the December contract settling at $1,531.10 an ounce.
The 10-2 Year Treasury Yield Spread widened slightly, although interest rates continued to fall. The 10-Year Treasury yield was 1.51%. The 2-Year yield was 1.484%.
Winners and Losers Among S&P 500 stocks
Scientific instrument company Agilent Technologies (NYSE:A), Walmart (NYSE:WMT), NetApp (NASDAQ:NTAP) and distiller Brown Forman (NYSE:BFb) were among the top S&P 500 performers.
Tapestry (NYSE:TPR), best known for its Coach luxury leather-goods brand, General Electric (NYSE:GE), Cisco Systems (NASDAQ:CSCO) and Gap (NYSE:GPS) were among the weakest S&P 500 performers.