US stocks rose slightly on Wednesday as investors awaited the minutes of the Federal Reserve meeting for clues on the pace of future interest rate hikes.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 130 points, or 0.38%. The S&P 500 gained 0.45% and the Nasdaq Composite rose 0.69%.
Nordstrom shares fell more than 7% after the department store chain reaffirmed its forecast. However, Nordstrom beat expectations for profit and sales in its latest results, according to consensus expectations on Refinitiv. Tesla rose 2.6% in early trading after Citi upgraded the stock to neutral from sell.
Jobless claims data came in higher than expected at 240,000 for the week ending Nov. 19, where economists had expected 225,000, indicating the labor market may be weakening. At the same time, however, durable goods orders in October were stronger than expected, coming in at 1%, up from the 0.5% expected.
“In the market’s interpretation, this is positive given that the Fed wants to see a rebalancing in the labor market whereby companies begin to leverage demand for higher wages,” said Quincy Krosby, chief global strategist at LPL Financial. “Higher wages have been consistently passed on as higher prices led to rising inflationary pressures.”
Investors are looking to the final minutes of the Fed’s meeting, scheduled for Wednesday afternoon, for the central bank’s approach to monetary policy ahead of the December meeting.
In early November, the central bank approved a fourth consecutive hike of 0.75 percentage points that took rates to their highest level since 2008. Economists expect a half-percentage-point increase in December and smaller hikes in next year
Wall Street is coming off an upbeat session, with the Dow Jones Industrial Average up nearly 400 points on Tuesday, as traders shrugged off fears of more lockdowns in China and looked for strong gains. The S&P 500 rose 1.36%, closing above the 4,000 level for the first time since September. Meanwhile, the Nasdaq Composite rose 1.36%.
Markets will be closed Thursday for the Thanksgiving holiday and close early Friday.
Correction: An earlier version of this story was corrected to reflect that Nordstrom restated its forecast.