US stocks mixed as traders weigh chance of Iran ceasefire extension

NEW YORK: Wall Street stocks were mixed early Tuesday as oil prices pulled back while traders weighed the likelihood of a longer ceasefire in the Middle East war. The Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 0.2 percent to 51,180.34, while the broad-based S&P 500 Index slipped 0.1 percent to 7,592.80. The tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite Index dipped 0.3 percent to 27,008.58. “Oil prices are lower, as President (Donald) Trump continues to tease the possibility of an extended ceasefire agreement with Iran that will also feature the reopening of the Strait of Hormuz,” said Patrick O’Hare of Briefing.com in a note. Trump earlier said that Iran talks were moving rapidly and that Israel and Hezbollah had agreed to stop fighting. O’Hare also pointed to a number of positive tech headlines including Google-parent Alphabet’s announcement of an $80 billion equity offering. “The peculiar element is that the equity futures market isn’t rallying around these reports,” O’Hare said. But analysts are not necessarily expecting the softness to persist either, he added. “Considering the run that we’ve been on,” said Steve Sosnick of Interactive Brokers, “it’s not unusual or wrong to see stocks taking a little bit of a breath here.” Among individual companies, Alphabet shares fell by 4.0 percent after it unveiled its plans to raise up to $80 billion in stock to fund a major expansion of its artificial intelligence infrastructure. Nvidia shares added 1.0 percent, while Hewlett-Packard Enterprise rallied 27.4 percent on an expectations-beating earnings report.

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