US Dow and S&P500 climbs to new records

The US stocks were modestly up on Tuesday, 26 October 2021, with the S&P 500 and Dow closing at new records, on optimism about more upbeat earnings news after better than expected results from several big-name companies. Meanwhile, positive sentiments also generated in reaction to pleasing new home sales and consumer confidence data.

Market gains, however, capped as investors reluctant to make more significant moves ahead of the Federal Reserve's monetary policy meeting next week. The Fed is likely to leave interest rates unchanged but could announce plans to begin scaling back its asset purchase program.

At the close of trade, the Dow Jones Industrial Average index advanced 15.73 points, or 0.04%, to 35,756.88. The S&P500 index added 8.31 points, or 0.18%, to 4,574.79. The tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite Index gained 9.01 points, or 0.06%, to 15,235.71.

Total volume turnover on U.S. exchanges stood at 11.55 billion shares, up from yesterday's 10.06 billion shares. Decling stocks outnumbered advaning ones on the NYSE exchange by 1844 to 1498 and 144 closed unchanged. In the NASDAQ, 2068 issues advanced, 2563 issues declined, and 212 issues unchanged.

Total 9 of 11 sectors ended up along with the S&P500 index, with energy (up 0.68%) was best performing sector, followed by utilities (up 0.56%) and healthcare (up 0.53%), while industrials (down 0.56%) was worst performing sector, followed by communication services (down 0.48%).

Shares of UPS advanced higher after the delivery giant reported better than expected third quarter results.

General Electric shares also moved to the upside after reporting better than expected third quarter earnings and raising its full-year guidance.

On the other hand, shares of Facebook closed down as a pledge to buy back more shares and increase spending on digital offerings was offset by a revenue miss in the third quarter earnings. The company warned that Apple Inc's new privacy changes would weigh on its digital business.

ECONOMIC NEWS: Report from the Commerce Department showed that new home sales in the U.S. skyrocketed 14% to an annual rate of 800,000 in September after falling by 1.4 percent to a downwardly revised rate of 702,000 in August.

A separate report from the Conference Board showed that consumer confidence index climbed to 113.8 in October from an upwardly revised 109.8 in September, amid easing concerns about the Delta variant of the coronavirus.

COMMODITY NEWS: Crude oil prices rose by up to 1.1% on Tuesday to 7-year highs on concerns tight global supplies to continue with forecasts for a colder-than-normal November. The Brent crude price rose by US41 cents or 0.5% to US$86.40 a barrel. The US Nymex crude price rose by US89 cents or 1.1% to US$84.65 a barrel.

The gold futures price fell by US$13.40 or 0.7% to U$1,793.40 an ounce. Spot gold was near US$1,793 an ounce at the US close.

Among Indian ADR, Vedanta added 0.58% to $17.21, WNS Holdings rose 0.35% to $85.03, and and Tata Motors added 3% to $33.17. Dr Reddys Labs fell 0.21% to $61.60, ICICI Bank fell 0.78% to $21.70, Wipro fell 0.97% to $9.19, INFOSYS fell 0.18% to $22.69, and HDFC Bank shed 1.28% to $75.70.

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