Wall Street Shakes Off Taper Tantrum as Stocks Rally Hard

January 30, 2014

•

2 min read

Stocks rallied big in Thursday trading after the Labor Department’s report that initial jobless claims from the previous week rose the most in six weeks was overshadowed by the Department of Commerce's own report that said that US gross domestic product grew 1.9 percent in 2013 from the year before.

Standard & Poor’s 500: +1.13 percent to 1,794.18
Dow Jones Industrial Average: +0.70 to 15,848.61
Nasdaq: +1.77 percent to 4,123.12

Our Top Stories:

Satyam Panday of S&P Capital IQ on the recent stalling of the housing market recovery.
Jacob Harper on what Facebook (FB) needs to do to stay on top.
Equities.comElite contributor John Mauldin explains why interest-rates will remain low despite the announcement of a second round of tapering yesterday.
The Life Sciences Reportis bullish on these two biotech stocks.
Doug Casey of Casey Research on the growing bullishness for gold.

On the Dow:

Nike (NKE) was the Dow’s best performer, adding over 3 percent by the bell. Most of the index’s components made substantial gains throughout the day, but notable exceptions were to be found in Boeing (BA) , whose shares are still hurting from a dismal earnings report, while ExxonMobil’s (XOM) own earnings report led the stock lower after investors were unhappy about disappointing production figures.

On the S&P 500:

Tech stocks led the S&P higher, with Facebook (FB) adding 14 percent by the end of the session as investors continue to marvel over the earnings report it released in late trading the previous day. Cisco Systems (CSCO) , Xerox Corp. (XRX) , and Micron Technology (MU) were among the beneficiaries of the day’s exuberance.

On the Nasdaq:

Techs were also prominent on the Nasdaq exchange, with big gains for hardware manufacturers like QUALCOMM Incorporated (QCOM) , Plug Power Inc. (PLUG) , and application software small-cap Accelrys (ACCL) up nearly 30 percent.

Jetblue Airways (JBLU) notched a gain of nearly 6 percent. Online catalog and mail order house Overstock.com Inc. (OSTK) was off by more than 22 percent by the bell.

Michael Teague

Michael Teague is a staff writer for Equities.com. His previous experience includes three years as the associate editor of Los Angeles-based Al Jadid Magazine, a bi-annual review of the arts & culture of the Middle East, where he contributed many articles on the region in the form of features and book & film reviews. His educational background includes a BA in French literature from the University of California, Irvine, where he developed a startling proclivity for anything having to do with the 19th century.