Wall Street advances as bond yields fall, and investors digest Fed meeting minutes

Oct 11 (Reuters) – Wall Street’s main indexes closed higher after a volatile session on Wednesday, with minutes from the U.S. Federal Reserve’s latest meeting showing caution among policymakers, helping fuel investors’ hopes that interest rates will remain steady.

Fed officials cited uncertainties surrounding the economy, oil prices and financial markets as supporting “the case for proceeding cautiously in determining how much additional policy tightening may be appropriate,” according to the minutes released Wednesday, Sept. 19-20. interview.

Trading was choppy on Wednesday, with all indices starting the session with gains before falling ahead of the meeting minutes and then regaining lost ground to move higher.

Combined with the recent moves in interest rates and dovish comments from Fed officials in the past few days, Angelo Corkavas, chief investment strategist at Edward Jones, said the minutes look encouraging for investors.

“Today’s release highlights the risks of over-tightening monetary policy, and knowing what has happened over the past three weeks in terms of interest rates, provides some comfort to investors that we will not see another rate hike,” Korkvas said.

But he noted that the Fed’s next decisions will take into account September’s CPI readings, which are scheduled to be released on Thursday before the market opens, as “reliance on data from the Fed has not gone away.”

Earlier Wednesday, data showed that U.S. producer prices rose more than expected in September amid rising costs for energy products, but underlying inflation pressures at the factory gate continued to moderate.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 65.57 points, or 0.19%, to 33,804.87, the S&P 500 rose 18.71 points, or 0.43%, to 4,376.95, and the Nasdaq Composite rose 96.83 points, or 0.43%. 0.71% to 13659.68.

The Energy Index (.SPNY) fell 1.4% and was the weakest among the 11 major industry sectors in the S&P. The index was affected by a 3.6% drop in Exxon Mobil shares after the oil and gas production company agreed to buy its competitor Pioneer Natural Resources (PXD.N) in an all-stock deal worth $59.5 billion. Pioneer shares closed up 1.4%.

The biggest gainers were interest rate-sensitive sectors, namely real estate (.SPLRCR), which added 2%, and utilities (.SPLRCU), which rose 1.6% as Treasury yields fell.

US Treasury yields on benchmark 10-year bonds fell to their lowest level in nearly two weeks, with prices rising on safe-haven flows as the war in the Middle East continues to rage after a deadly weekend attack by Hamas on Israel.

Israel continued to bombard Gaza with retaliatory air strikes that killed dozens of civilians, as it formed an emergency unity government on Wednesday and its army said it had killed three Hamas activists.

The mood on Wednesday was the latest initial public offering (IPO). Birkenstock Holding (BIRK.N) shares closed 12.6% lower at $40.20. On its first day of trading on the New York Stock Exchange, shares of the German shoe company never reached its IPO price of $46.

Pharmaceutical company Eli Lilly’s shares gained 4.5 percent after the early announcement of the success of Ozimbic, a subsidiary of its Danish competitor Novo Nordisk, in a trial to treat kidney failure, while shares of dialysis companies DaVita and Baxter International rose. N) decreased by 16.7% and 12.3%, respectively.

Advancing issues outnumbered declining issues on the NYSE by a ratio of 1.65 to 1; On the Nasdaq, a 1.19-to-1 ratio favored losing stocks.

The S&P 500 recorded 12 new 52-week highs and 10 new lows; The Nasdaq Composite recorded 44 new highs and 206 new lows.

On US stock exchanges, 10 billion shares were traded compared to an average of 10.7 billion shares during the last 20 sessions.

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