By Caroline Valetkevitch
NEW YORK (Reuters) -Global stock indexes mostly inched higher on Wednesday after upbeat results from Google parent Alphabet, while gold prices rose to a record high ahead of the U.S. presidential election.
British stocks hit their lowest level since August as UK Finance Minister Rachel Reeves said she would raise taxes by 40 billion pounds a year ($52 billion) in her first budget.
Shares of Alphabet rose more than 5%, giving the S&P 500 its biggest boost. Alphabet reported quarterly revenue that beat estimates.
On the flip side, semiconductor company Advanced Micro Devices shares dropped 9.6% after its revenue forecasts and artificial intelligence chip sales disappointed investors. Other chipmakers also slipped, with Nvidia down 1%.
Facebook owner Meta Platforms and Microsoft report earnings later in the day, followed by Apple and Amazon.com on Thursday.
“The market is heavily focused on what these companies are going to deliver, their guidance and any signal that perhaps their purchases of AI-related infrastructure could change,” said Quincy Krosby, chief global strategist at LPL Financial in Charlotte, North Carolina.
Stocks are up sharply for the year so far, and Krosby said upbeat results from the megacap names will help to support the overall market.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 218.42 points, or 0.52%, to 42,451.47, the S&P 500 climbed 15.33 points, or 0.26%, to 5,848.32 and the Nasdaq Composite advanced 37.79 points, or 0.20%, to 18,750.54.
MSCI’s gauge of stocks across the globe rose 0.51 points, or 0.06%, to 848.59.
The STOXX 600 index dropped 1.04%, while the FTSE 100 fell 0.7%. Shares of Italian spirit maker Campari slumped after missing forecasts.
Gold rose to an all-time high as uncertainty over the Nov. 5 U.S. presidential election boosted safe-haven demand.
A recent Reuters/Ipsos poll showed Vice President Kamala Harris, a Democrat, leading Republican Donald Trump 44% to 43% among registered voters nationally, within the margin of error. Other opinion polls show tight margins in the seven election battleground states.
Among riskier assets, bitcoin was down slightly after surging to near its all-time high from March as investors weighed the prospect of a victory by Trump, widely seen as favorable towards crypto.
“Bitcoin has been considered an important barometer for liquidity in the market,” Krosby said, adding that its recent gains have been “associated with a Trump victory.”
Bitcoin was last down 0.64% at $71,846.00.
The dollar edged down against other major currencies as stronger-than-expected U.S. private payrolls data and the UK budget release set off choppy trading as investors awaited clues about the future policy paths of their respective central banks.
Data showed U.S. private payrolls growth surged in October. The key U.S. jobs report for October is due on Friday.
The U.S. dollar index, which measures the currency against six major rivals, rose to 104.43 earlier in the session but was last down 0.16% at 104.07.
Sterling weakened 0.03% to $1.3011.
Benchmark 10-year U.S. Treasury yields slipped, in line with tumbling yields on British government debt. Benchmark 10-year yields were last down 5.2 basis points at 4.222%, after reaching a nearly four-month peak of 4.339% on Tuesday.
Investors were also digesting data showing the euro zone grew faster than expected last quarter. A separate report showed the U.S. economy had maintained steady third-quarter growth.
In the energy market, U.S. crude rose 2.54% to $68.92 a barrel and Brent rose to $72.79 per barrel, up 2.35% on the day.
Earlier in Asia, MSCI’s broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan fell 0.8% to a one-month low.
Reuters reported on Tuesday that China is considering approving the issuance of more than 10 trillion yuan ($1.4 trillion) in extra debt in the next few years to revive its fragile economy.
(Additional reporting by Tom Wilson in London and Rae Wee in Singapore; Editing by Jacqueline Wong, Christina Fincher, David Evans and Richard Chang)
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