And there it is: Markets opened on a virtual rocket ship upward as the Dow Jones Industrial Average rose more than 150 points Tuesday to blow past October 2007’s high mark, while the S&P 500 nibbled at the edges of its own record all day. The party ended with the Dow cracking a new record, and an impressive move to the upside for all three indices.
The Dow, which ended the day with only two components in the red, finished up 0.89% at 14253.77, while the S&P 500 closed ahead 0.96% to 1539.79. The Nasdaq registered the highest percentage gain on the day, ahead 1.32% to end at 3224.13 — its highest level since November 2000.
Dow components Hewlett-Packard (NYSE:HPQ), United Technologies (NYSE:UTX), Cisco (NASDAQ:CSCO), Boeing (NYSE:BA) and American Express (NYSE:AXP) all finished up nearly 2% or more.
The Nasdaq was powered by a rally from two of its biggest heavyweights: Apple (NASDAQ:AAPL) and Google (NASDAQ:GOOG) each gained more than 2%, with the latter continuing to set new all-time highs.
On a day of few low points, of the biggest major casualties was JCPenney (NYSE:JCP), which saw its shares sink more than 10% amid a Wall Street Journal report that said Penney’s board would consider either a buyout or a replacement for CEO Ron Johnson should its sales continue to lag.
Three Up
- Cree (NASDAQ:CREE): Up 14.4% ($6.44) to $51.16. (Read more here)
- Sears Holdings (NASDAQ:SHLD): Up 5.6% ($2.46) to $46.63.
- Groupon (NASDAQ:GRPN): Up 4% (22 cents) to $5.64.
Three Down
- Impax Laboratories (NASDAQ:IPXL): Down 26% ($5.20) to $14.80.
- Affymax (NASDAQ:AFFY): Down 6.4% (16 cents) to $2.36.
- Boyd Gaming (NYSE:BYD): Down 5.7% (42 cents) to $6.97.
Marc Bastow is an Assistant Editor at InvestorPlace.com. As of this writing he is long AAPL.
