NEW YORK (AP) 鈥� U.S. stock indexes rose to more records Wednesday after tech companies talked up how much of a boost they鈥檙e getting from the boom.
The S&P 500 climbed 0.6% to add to what鈥檚 set to be one of its best years of the millennium. It鈥檚 the 56th time the index has hit an all-time high this year after climbing in .
The Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 308 points, or 0.7%, while the Nasdaq composite added 1.3% to its own record.
Salesforce helped pull the market higher after delivering stronger revenue for the latest quarter than analysts expected, though its profit fell just short.
CEO Mark Benioff highlighted the company鈥檚 artificial-intelligence offering for customers, saying 鈥渢he rise of autonomous AI agents is revolutionizing global labor, reshaping how industries operate and scale.鈥� The stock price of the company, which helps businesses manage their customers, jumped 11%.
Marvell Technology leaped even more after delivering better results than expected, up 23.2%. CEO Matt Murphy said the semiconductor supplier is seeing strong demand from AI and gave a forecast for profit in the upcoming quarter that topped analysts鈥� expectations.
All the optimistic talk helped , the company whose chips are powering much of the move into AI, rally 3.5%. It was the strongest force pushing upward on the S&P 500 by far.
They helped offset an 8.9% drop for Foot Locker, which reported profit and revenue that fell short of analysts鈥� expectations.
CEO Mary Dillon said the company is taking a more cautious view, and it cut its forecasts for sales and profit this year. Dillon pointed to how keen customers are for discounts and how soft demand has been outside of and other key selling periods.
overall have offered about how resilient U.S. shoppers can remain. Their spending has been one of the main reasons the that earlier after the Federal Reserve hiked interest rates to crush inflation. But shoppers are now contending with still-high prices and .
This week鈥檚 highlight for Wall Street will be Friday鈥檚 jobs report from the U.S. government, which will show how many people employers hired and fired last month. A narrower report released Wednesday morning suggested employers in the private sector increased their payrolls by less last month than economists expected. Hiring in manufacturing was the weakest since the spring, according to Nela Richardson, chief economist at ADP.
The report strengthened traders鈥� expectations that the Fed will cut its main interest rate again when it meets in two weeks.
The Fed began from a two-decade high in September, hoping to offer more support for the job market. The central bank had appeared set to continue cutting rates into next year, but the election of Donald Trump has scrambled Wall Street鈥檚 expectations somewhat. Trump鈥檚 preference for and could lead to higher , which could alter the .
Fed Chair that the central bank can afford to cut rates cautiously because inflation has slowed from its peak two years ago and the economy remains sturdy.
A separate report on Wednesday said health care, finance and other businesses in the U.S. services sector are continuing to grow, but not by as much as before and not by as much as economists expected.
One respondent from the construction industry told the survey from the Institute for Supply Management that the Fed鈥檚 rate cuts haven’t pulled down as much as hoped. Plus, 鈥渢he unknown effect of tariffs clouds the future.鈥�
In the bond market, the yield on the 10-year Treasury fell to 4.18% from 4.23% late Tuesday.
On Wall Street, Campbell鈥檚 sank 6.2% for one of the S&P 500鈥檚 sharper losses despite increasing its dividend and reporting a stronger profit than analysts expected. Its revenue fell short of Wall Street鈥檚 expectations, and the National Football League鈥檚 as its team president.
Gains for airline stocks helped offset that drop after JetBlue Airways said it saw stronger bookings for travel in November and December following the presidential election. It also said it鈥檚 benefiting from lower fuel prices, as well as lower costs due to improved on-time performance.
JetBlue jumped 8.3%, while Southwest Airlines climbed 3.5%.
All told, the S&P 500 rose 36.61 points to 6,086.49. The Dow climbed 308.51 to 45,014.04, and the Nasdaq composite rallied 254.21 to 19,735.12.
In stock markets abroad, South Korea鈥檚 Kospi sank 1.4% following a night full of drama in Seoul.
President Yoon Suk Yeol was facing after he suddenly on Tuesday night, prompting troops to surround the parliament. He revoked the martial law declaration six hours later.
In , bitcoin climbed near $99,000 after Trump said he would , a cryptocurrency advocate, to chair the Securities and Exchange Commission.
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AP Writers Matt Ott and Zimo Zhong contributed.
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