Wall Street reaches its best level in more than three months

NEW YORK (AP) — Stock prices on the New York Stock Exchange rose again on Monday in what will be a short Thanksgiving week, reaching their highest level in more than three months.

The S&P 500 gained 33.36 points, or 0.7%, to 4,547.38 after its third consecutive week of gains. The Dow Jones Industrial Average added 203.76 points, or 0.6%, to 33,151.04, and the Nasdaq Composite rose 159.05 points, or 1.1%, to 14,284.53 points.

Microsoft was the one that drove the market the most. It rose 2.1% after announcing it was hiring Sam Altman for a new company following his sudden dismissal as CEO of OpenAI, the creator of ChatGPT. Microsoft indicated that it will also continue its partnership with OpenAI, as the fervor around artificial intelligence technology and the huge profits it is expected to generate continue to dominate Wall Street.

The stock market is increasingly convinced that inflation is cooling enough for the Federal Reserve to finally conclude its interest rate hikes, which it raises to combat rising prices, but that puts pressure on the market. In addition, traders’ expectations are growing about when the Fed could actually start cutting rates.

Even though central bank officials say they can keep rates high for a while to ensure inflation is defeated for good, brokers believe the first cut could come in the summer or perhaps even next March. Rate cuts tend to act as steroids for the markets and provide oxygen to the entire financial system.

Due to the Thanksgiving holiday, the federal government will release its weekly update on unemployment claims on Wednesday instead of Thursday as usual. Aside from that, the release of minutes from the Federal Reserve’s latest monetary policy meeting on Tuesday and preliminary reports on U.S. business activity on Friday are among the highlights.

For its part, the yield on the 10-year Treasury bond fell from 4.44% to 4.42%.

Crude oil prices rose, recovering somewhat from their sharp declines over the past two months. The barrel of US oil for delivery in December gained 1.71 dollars, settling at 77.60 dollars, although it is still well below the 93 dollars at which it was quoted at the end of September.

Brent crude oil, the international benchmark, increased by $1.71 and closed at $82.32 per barrel.

Zimo Zhong contributed to this report.

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