S&P 500 vaults to fresh high while earnings drag on Dow

Live9 updates

• Tue, January 23, 2024 at 9:03 PM GMT

  S&P 500 hits a new high

  The S&P 500 (^GSPC) extended its record-setting rally as focus turned to the day’s stream of earnings for insights into the health of corporate America and the economy.

  The S&P 500 rose nearly 0.3% to hit a new closing high of 4,864.61. The Nasdaq Composite (^IXIC) also popped Tuesday, rising 0.4% while the Dow Jones Industrial Average (^DJI) fell about 0.2% after the blue-chip index broke above 38,000 for the first time on Monday.

• Tue, January 23, 2024 at 8:16 PM GMT

  Can you smell … what the board is cooking?

  News early Tuesday that Netflix (NFLX) and TKO Group (TKO), which owns WWE, would partner to bring Raw to the streaming service drew most of the headlines and sent shares of TKO up more than 16%.

  But another release out this morning saw TKO shake up its board and add one of the biggest stars of this era to its director ranks.

  Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson was added to TKO’s board, effective today, in a deal that will also see Johnson secure ownership of the trademarked name “The Rock.”

  “I’m very motivated to help continue to globally expand our TKO, WWE, and UFC businesses as the worldwide leaders in sports and entertainment,” Johnson said in a release, “while proudly representing so many phenomenal athletes and performers who show up every day putting in the hard work with their own two hands to make their dreams come true and deliver for our audiences. I’ve been there, I’m still there, and this is for them.”

  In an SEC filing, TKO also disclosed that as part of its licensing deal with Johnson, The Rock will be granted $30 million worth of company stock.

  TKO also announced that Brad Keywell, co-founder of Groupon, will join its board.

• Tue, January 23, 2024 at 6:45 PM GMT

  Not all stocks are expensive with stocks at market highs

  Major indexes in the stock market are at market highs, and many Wall Street strategists have pointed out the S&P 500 (^GSPC) trading at more than 21 times forward earnings is a historically high valuation for the stock market.

  But new analysis from the team at UBS out on Tuesday shows not everything is too expensive right now.

  Strategist Patrick Palfrey highlighted that 77% of S&P 500 companies trade at a discount to their January 2022 levels (the previous market high). Of those companies, 55% of them currently have a lower price-to-earnings ratio than they had at the previous market top.

  Now, while one could see that as a buying opportunity in the stocks not back to 2021 levels, it does come with an important caveat. Analysis from Bespoke Investment Group last Friday showed 75% of the S&P 500’s gains this year have been driven by Microsoft (MSFT) and Nvidia (NVDA).

  Both of those stocks are trading near all-time highs with valuations higher than they were in January 2021.

  As of January 19th, NVIDIA $NVDA and Microsoft $MSFT had accounted for about 75% of the S&P 500’s gain this year, while the 20 largest stocks in the index accounted for 110% of the index’s upside move. The remaining ~480 stocks were acting as a drag. pic.twitter.com/b8EvAIWfhj

  — Bespoke (@bespokeinvest) January 22, 2024

• Tue, January 23, 2024 at 5:53 PM GMT

  Staples, Communications Services lead market action

  After a tech rally has pushed the market to new record highs, earnings in other…