March 11 (UPI) — All three major U.S. indexes hit record highs Thursday as a rally in tech stocks continued and President Joe Biden signed the $1.9 trillion COVID-19 relief bill.
The Nasdaq led the way, gaining 2.52%, while the S&P 500 climbed 1.04% and the Dow Jones Industrial Average closed the day up 188.57 points, or 0.58%, extending gains from Wednesday.
Tech stocks saw a boost after declining earlier in the week due to concerns over inflation and high bond yields.
Tesla stock gained 4.72%, while Facebook and Netflix each grew 3% and Microsoft, Apple and Amazon each climbed more than 1.5%.
Mark Haefele, chief investment officer at UBS, said he believes recent volatility is likely to continue but there is still cause for optimism surrounding the greater market.
“While we expect conditions to remain volatile, the most recent developments on three of the main market drivers — stimulus, pandemic news and inflation data — point to further equity upside,” Haefele said in a note.
Thursday saw Biden sign the American Rescue Plan, which the White House said could send $1,400 to Americans as early as this weekend in addition to providing funding for more vaccinations, vital benefits such as unemployment and an increased child tax credit.
“The stimulus is beating the virus at least as far as the market is concerned,” Scott Ladner, chief investment officer at Horizon Investments, said, according to CNBC. “And real rates being near negative is just historically a very strong tailwind for asset prices.”
Markets also reacted to positive unemployment data as the Labor Department on Thursday reported that 712,000 U.S. workers filed for new unemployment benefits as analysts were expecting about 725,000 initial claims for the week ending March 6.
