U.S. stock indexes rose Tuesday afternoon while oil pulled back from a five-month peak, lifting airline shares as investors also weighed weaker housing data and the cost of financing artificial-intelligence projects.
At 1:48 p.m. EDT, the Associated Press put the S&P 500 0.4% higher, the Dow Jones Industrial Average up 1% and the Nasdaq Composite up 0.2%. The Associated Press also reported Brent crude at $108.70 a barrel, down 0.8%.
American Airlines rose 4.4% and United Airlines gained 2.8% in the same afternoon snapshot. NDTV Profit said sustained high oil prices could raise transport and production expenses, add to inflation and weigh on corporate margins and household spending.
Brent’s retreat followed an earlier climb in the oil benchmark to a five-month high. Reuters said traders had been assessing risks to Middle Eastern oil supplies after Yemen’s Houthis claimed attacks on Saudi energy, airport and military sites. Saudi authorities had not confirmed the claims.
The day began with mixed U.S. futures. NDTV Profit reported in a premarket account that Nasdaq-100 futures were down 0.34%, Dow futures rose 0.28% and S&P 500 futures were nearly unchanged. The report did not specify when the quotes were taken.
Chip stocks also weakened before the opening bell. NDTV Profit and Summa Money reported Micron Technology down 2.2%, Intel off 1.2% and Qualcomm lower by 0.35%. Reuters traced some of the prior week’s technology losses to concern about CoreWeave’s borrowing and the cost of financing AI infrastructure. ActivTrades analyst Ion Jauregui told Reuters that investors had become more selective about AI stories than they were a year earlier.
Housing data offered another measure of the economy. The U.S. Census Bureau said September housing starts fell 5.2% from August to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 1.221 million. The National Association of REALTORS® reported that September pending home sales were down 7.3% from August and 11.3% from a year earlier.
General Motors released its third-quarter results before trading began. United Airlines had scheduled its third-quarter report for after the market close.
