NEW YORK, Jan. 30 (Xinhua) -- U.S. stocks ended higher on Thursday, as investors weighed a series of key earnings reports.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 168.61 points, or 0.38 percent, to 44,882.13. The S&P 500 added 31.86 points, or 0.53 percent, to 6,071.17. The Nasdaq Composite Index increased 49.43 points, or 0.25 percent, to 19,681.75.
Ten of the 11 primary S&P 500 sectors ended in green, with utilities and real estate leading the gainers by going up 2.14 percent and 1.36 percent, respectively. Meanwhile, technology bucked the trend by losing 0.56 percent.
The U.S. economy grew at an annual rate of 2.3 percent in the fourth quarter, according to the Commerce Department's preliminary GDP estimate, falling short of the 2.6 percent consensus forecast. However, consumer spending remained surprisingly strong, with personal consumption expenditures (PCE) rising at an annual rate of 4.2 percent, significantly above the expected 3.1 percent and the previous quarter's 3.7 percent increase.
Meanwhile, the labor market showed resilience as initial jobless claims for the week ending Jan. 25 dropped to 207,000, well below the expected 224,000 and the previous week's 223,000. These figures suggest continued strength in consumer demand and employment, factors that could influence the Fed's future policy decisions.
On corporate front, Tesla was up 2.84 percent despite reporting weaker-than-expected quarterly results. Tesla CEO Elon Musk's announcement that the company will launch more affordable models in early 2025 and begin testing an autonomous ride-hailing service in June overshadowed the earnings miss.
Meta also provided a boost, with shares rising 1.55 percent after the company beat fourth-quarter revenue estimates. However, its outlook for the current quarter was more cautious. IBM jumped 12.96 percent after surpassing profit expectations, while Microsoft fell as its cloud computing growth forecast disappointed investors.
Artificial intelligence (AI) investment remained in focus as the CEOs of Meta and Microsoft defended their AI spending, just days after Chinese startup DeepSeek's breakthrough in cost-efficient AI models triggered a sell-off in AI-linked stocks.
