Financial Markets                      10/31 09:31

   

   NEW YORK (AP) -- The mighty heft of Amazon is hoisting the U.S. stock market 
higher on Friday.

   The S&P 500 rose 0.5%, erasing some of its slump from the day before and 
pulling closer to its all-time high set on Tuesday. The index is on track to 
close a third straight winning week and a sixth straight winning month, which 
would be its longest monthly winning streak since 2021.

   The Dow Jones Industrial Average was up 61 points, or 0.1%, as of 10 a.m. 
Eastern time, and the Nasdaq composite was 0.9% higher.

   Amazon led the way after jumping 11.4%. The retail giant was by far the 
strongest force lifting the market after reporting profit for the latest 
quarter that blew past analysts' expectations. CEO Andy Jassy said growth for 
its booming cloud-computing business has reaccelerated back to a pace it hasn't 
seen since 2022.

   Because Amazon is so massive, worth roughly $2.4 trillion, its stock 
movements carry more weight on the S&P 500 than almost any other company's. And 
without Amazon, the index at the heart of many 401(k) accounts would have been 
close to flat on Friday.

   Another highly influential stock, Apple, was having less of an effect even 
though it's bigger than Amazon. Apple, which is worth more than $4 trillion, 
was swinging between modest gains and losses.

   It likewise delivered a better profit report than analysts expected, though 
by not as big a margin as Amazon did. CEO Tim Cook said it benefited from 
strong revenue for both its iPhone lineup and its services offerings, which 
include its app store.

   Elsewhere on Wall Street, online message board Reddit jumped 15.2% to erase 
losses from earlier in the week after reporting stronger profit and revenue for 
the latest quarter than analysts expected.

   Coinbase Global rose 6% after the crypto exchange's profit likewise topped 
expectations.

   Outside of earnings reports, Netflix added 3.2% after the video streamer 
announced a move that could make its stock price more affordable but still 
leave all its investors holding the same amount. Netflix will undergo a 
10-for-1 stock split, where it will give nine additional shares to every 
investor with one.

   They helped offset a 3.8% drop for AbbVie, even though the medicine maker 
reported stronger profit for the latest quarter than expected. Analysts pointed 
to how it's beating forecasts by less than before, and expectations may have 
been high after AbbVie came into the day with a strong 28.4% gain for the year 
so far.

   The pressure is on companies to deliver strong growth in profits to help 
justify the huge gains their stock prices have made since April. Criticism has 
been growing that the stock market has become too expensive.

   Friday's gains helped Wall Street recover from Thursday's slump, when the 
S&P 500 fell 1%. Investors appeared unnerved by big increases in spending that 
Meta Platforms and Microsoft are planning as the investment spree related to 
artificial-intelligence technology keeps gushing. Financial markets also 
appeared skeptical that President Donald Trump's trade truce with China would 
put an end to tensions between the two countries.

   Additional drops of 1.3% for Microsoft and 0.9% for Meta on Friday were two 
of the heaviest weights on the U.S. market.

   In stock markets abroad, indexes dipped in Europe following a mixed finish 
in Asia Friday.

   Stocks fell 1.4% in Hong Kong and 0.8% in Shanghai after data showed factory 
activity in China contracted in October for a seventh straight month and at the 
fastest pace in six months.

   Japan's Nikkei 225, meanwhile, jumped 2.1% to another record index after a 
report showed industrial production rose more in September than expected.

   In the bond market, Treasury yields eased after their spurt higher in the 
middle of the week, when Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell warned markets 
that another cut to interest rates in December "is not a foregone conclusion -- 
far from it."

   The yield on the 10-year Treasury dipped to 4.07% from 4.11% late Thursday, 
but it's still above the 3.99% level it was at before Powell's warning.

   Other central banks have halted cuts to rates or hinted at pauses recently, 
and "it seems this is it for the 2025 easing season in developed economies," 
economists at Bank of America wrote in a BofA Global Research report.

   ___

   AP Business Writers Teresa Cerojano and Matt Ott contributed.

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