Wall Street ended the week on a positive note, with the main indexes edging out gains ahead of Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell’s comments at a monetary policy panel. Investors were optimistic that a deal to avoid a catastrophic U.S. debt default could be reached over the weekend. President Joe Biden and Republican U.S. House Speaker Kevin McCarthy voiced growing confidence about striking a deal soon.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average was up 0.24%, the S&P 500 was up 0.33%, and the Nasdaq Composite was up 0.06%. Deere & Co rose 4.4% after the heavy machinery company raised its annual net income forecast. Morgan Stanley fell 0.5% after CEO James Gorman announced he would step down from the role in the next 12 months. Foot Locker Inc plunged 25.2% after the footwear retailer cut its annual sales and profit forecasts.
Regional banks showed signs of steadying after few volatile weeks, with the KBW Regional Banking index up 8.6% for the week. The benchmark S&P 500 index and the Nasdaq were set for their best weekly performance since late March. Alphabet Inc added 0.7% on a report that Samsung Electronics won’t be swapping its default search engine from Google to Microsoft’s Bing any time soon. Over 90% of S&P 500 companies have reported, of which around 77% beat earnings expectations.