How major US stock indexes fared Thursday 7/28/2022

The Associated Press

Stocks closed broadly higher again Thursday after a report that signaled the U.S. economy may be in a recession stoked optimism on Wall Street that the Federal Reserve can now avoid more big interest rate hikes in its bid to tame inflation. The indexes fell in the early going after the Commerce Department reported that the economy shrank from April through June, contracting at a 0.9% annual pace. The latest decline in the gross domestic product — the broadest gauge of the economy — followed a 1.6% annual drop from January through March. Consecutive quarters of falling GDP are an informal, though not definitive, indicator of a recession.

On Thursday:

The S&P 500 rose 48.82 points, or 1.2%, to 4,072.43.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 332.04 points, or 1%, to 32,529.63.

The Nasdaq rose 130.17 points, or 1.1%, to 12,162.59.

The Russell 2000 index of smaller companies rose 24.69, or 1.3%, to 1,873.03.

For the week:

The S&P 500 is up 110.80 points, or 2.8%.

The Dow is up 630.34 points, or 2%.

The Nasdaq is up 328.48, or 2.8%.

The Russell 200 is up 66.15 points, or 3.7%.

For the year:

The S&P 500 is down 693.75 points, or 14.6%.

The Dow is down 3,808.67 points, or 10.5%.

The Nasdaq is down 3,482.38 points, or 22.3%.

The Russell 2000 is down 372.29 points, or 16.6%.