US: Stocks gain as Tesla, Amazon bounce

[NEW YORK] Wall Street stocks finished a volatile session solidly higher on Tuesday, recovering some of the prior day's losses on strong gains by Tesla, Amazon and other tech companies.

After a bruising start to the second quarter on Monday, US stocks benefited from investor bargain-hunting and hopes the upcoming earnings period would shake the market out of its current anxiety over trade policy and technology industry problems.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average jumped 1.6 per cent to 24,032.53.

The broad-based S&P 500 advanced 1.3 per cent to 2,614.44, while the tech-rich Nasdaq Composite Index won one per cent to 6,941.28.

Quincy Krosby, chief market strategist at Prudential Annuities, said that during the next earnings period investors would be looking not only at financial performance, but at how executives gauge the odds of a trade war.

"The market does need a catalyst to regain its footing," she said.

Tesla Motors shot up 6 per cent after reporting that it reached weekly production of about 2,000 Model 3 sedans at the end of the first quarter - still below its 2,500 target, but "exponentially" better than previously, the company said.

Amazon also pushed higher, winning 1.5 per cent as investors greeted headlines that suggested President Donald Trump did not plan to follow up a series of irate tweets with concrete action against the company.

Other large technology companies that have been slumping also enjoyed gains, including Facebook, Google parent Alphabet and Intel.

Music streaming service Spotify surged 13.3 per cent in its first day of trading on the New York Stock Exchange.

Automakers gained after reporting higher US car sales in March, with General Motors climbing 3.2 per cent and Ford 2.8 per cent.

Oil-linked equities climbed, including Halliburton, Schlumberger and Chevron, which all rose at least 1.5 per cent on higher oil prices.

AFP