Wall Street’s main indexes rose ahead of a long weekend, with the blue-chip Dow hitting a record high for the first time since the Iran war began, as investors tracked progress in talks to end the nearly three-month-old conflict, reports Reuters.
The S&P 500 is on track for an eighth consecutive weekly gain, which would mark its best winning streak since December 2023.
Most megacap and growth stocks traded higher, with Apple up 2 per cent, hitting a market capitalisation of more than $4.5 trillion for the first time.
Semiconductor stocks, a key driver of recent Wall Street gains, were broadly up with the Philadelphia chip index rising 2.4pc. Qualcomm led the pack with a 12% jump.
PC makers Dell Technologies and HP Inc surged over 15pc each after China’s Lenovo Group reported a better-than-expected 27pc jump in quarterly revenue.