Wall St ticks up in volatile trading; McDonald's, Visa rise

By Tanya Agrawal

REUTERS - U.S. stocks edged up in choppy trading on Wednesday as McDonald's turnaround plan and Visa's potential entry into China helped investors shrug off a mixed bag of results.

Dow component McDonald's rose 3.7 percent to $98.44 as the company said it was working on a plan to improve sales and profit, while Coca-Cola rose 1.1 percent to $41.22 after its revenue increased for the first time in nine quarters.

Visa gained as much as 7.1 percent to hit a record of $69.98, while MasterCard came shy of its all-time high after China said it would open up its market to foreign firms for clearing domestic bank card transactions from June.

MasterCard rose as much as 5.3 percent to $92.43.

Various companies have cited the negative effect of the strong dollar for cutting their forecasts. The dollar gained about 23 percent against a basket of major currencies over the financial year ended March 31, hurting companies with large overseas operations.

The U.S. currency will likely stop, or at least pause, its rapid rate of ascent, according to Dan Skelly, head of equity model portfolio at Morgan Stanley Wealth Management.

He said, however, that "people are somewhat nervous that this could be a period where we have overall negative earnings."

Of the S&P 500 companies that have reported so far this earnings season, 71.9 percent have posted earnings above analyst expectations. However, just 42.1 percent have beaten revenue expectations, less than the 58 percent beat over the last four quarters.

At 11:56 a.m. EDT (1556 GMT) the Dow Jones industrial average was up 37.86 points, or 0.21 percent, at 17,987.45, the S&P 500 was up 5.39 points, or 0.26 percent, at 2,102.68 and the Nasdaq Composite was up 6.33 points, or 0.13 percent, at 5,020.43.

Boeing fell 2.3 percent to $149.73 after reporting revenue that fell short of expectations, while Chipotle fell 6.9 percent to $644.80 a day after it reported the slowest same-restaurant sales growth in five quarters.

Angie's List jumped 12.8 percent to $6.91 and was among the most actively traded stocks after the company posted a surprise profit.

U.S. home resales surged to their highest level in 18 months in March as more homes came on the market, a sign of strength in housing ahead of the spring selling season.

Advancing issues outnumbered declining ones on the NYSE by 1,507 to 1,379, for a 1.09-to-1 ratio on the upside; on the Nasdaq, 1,314 issues fell and 1,293 advanced for a 1.02-to-1 ratio favoring decliners.

The benchmark S&P 500 index was posting 19 new 52-week highs and no new lows; the Nasdaq Composite was recording 63 new highs and 24 new lows.

Companies reporting results after the market close on Wednesday include AT&T, Facebook and EBay.

(Editing by Savio D'Souza and Rodrigo Campos)