S&P 500 Climbs as Tech Makes Comeback After Yields Slip; Apple Unveils New iPhone

By Yasin Ebrahim

Investing.com -- The S&P 500 climbed Wednesday as tech jumped after Treasury yields took a breather from their recent march higher despite Federal Reserve officials reiterating the need to tighten monetary policy measures to tame inflation.

The S&P 500 rose 1.5%, the Dow Jones Industrial Average gained 1.3%, or 404 points, the Nasdaq was up 1.6%.

Microsoft (NASDAQ: MSFT ) and Google (NASDAQ: GOOGL ) led big tech higher, up more than 1%, while Apple Inc (NASDAQ: AAPL ), was marginally higher after announcing the release of its iPhone 14 and iPhone 14+.

Analysts have talked up the prospect of Apple’s new phone triggering a strong upgrade cycle as many iPhone customers haven’t upgraded their phones in years.

“Our estimates [are] that 240 million of 1 billion iPhone users worldwide have not upgraded their phones in over 3.5 years,” Wedbush said in a recent note.

Apple also released its Apple Watch Series 8 and new AirPods.

Twitter (NYSE: TWTR ), meanwhile, gained more than 5% after a Delaware Court rejected Elon Musk’s request to delay a trial launched by Twitter seeking to stop the billionaire from walking away from a deal to buy the social media company.

The court did, however, allow Musk to add whistleblower claims related to security vulnerability and fake user accounts on the platform to his countersuit.

Tech, which has been under pressure in recent days, was also boosted by easing Treasury yields.

Fed vice president Lael Brainard said Wednesday that monetary policy will need to be restrictive for some time and added that the central bank would need to see “several months of low monthly inflation readings,” to be sure that inflation is slowing to the Fed’s 2% target.

Other growth areas of the market were also in the ascendency, powered by rallying retailers, with Ross Stores Inc (NASDAQ: ROST ), TJX Companies Inc (NYSE: TJX ) and Target Corporation (NYSE: TGT ) among the biggest gainers.

Energy was the sole sector in the red following a 5% slump in oil prices as weaker economic data from China stoked fears that slowing global growth will dent demand.

"Oil's breakdown today is a bigger shot across the bow, pointing to further struggles ahead in our opinion. We believe the commodity can break below $80 from here, targeting the mid-$70s range in the weeks ahead," Janney Montgomery Scott said.