Dovish Fed minutes send US stocks up more than 1%

In this Tuesday, April 8, 2014 file photo, specialist Jason Hardzewicz, left, works at his post on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange. Wall Street stocks Wednesday bolted higher with tech equities leading the way after US Federal Reserve minutes showed no support for an early rise in interest rates. AP

NEW YORK—Wall Street stocks Wednesday bolted higher with tech equities leading the way after US Federal Reserve minutes showed no support for an early rise in interest rates.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average jumped 181.04 (1.11 percent) to 16,437.18.

The broad-based S&P 500 advanced 20.22 (1.09 percent) to 1,872.18, while the tech-rich Nasdaq Composite Index soared 70.91 points (1.72 percent) to 4,183.90.

Stocks were higher through early afternoon, but rose more after the Fed minutes were released at 1800 GMT. The minutes, as expected, showed the US central bank foresees continuing the steady cutback to its stimulus program.

But they also showed there was not a groundswell of Fed powerbrokers who supported a speedy rise to benchmark interest rates.

“There’s been this overriding fear in the market that tightening would be sooner on the horizon than people imagine,” said Brent Schutte, market strategist at BMO Global Asset Management. “Today’s minutes walk back some of those fears.”

For the second day in a row, the Nasdaq outperformed the other two indices after lagging badly over the last month.

Facebook jumped 7.3 percent, Priceline rose 4.0 percent and Apple rose 1.3 percent.

Biotech equities, a particularly hard-hit group of late, also did well. Celgene jumped 6.6 percent, Biogen rose 5.2 percent and Gilead Sciences advanced 0.9 percent.

Merck (+3.7 percent) led the Dow, with strong gains also posted by American Express (+2.6 percent), Visa (+2.4 percent) and Boeing (+2.2 percent.)

General Motors took another hit from the scandal over its delayed recall of vehicles, dropping 2.6 percent on reports that the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration will fine the automaker $28,000 for failing to respond to questions over the recall.

Aluminum producer Alcoa jumped 3.8 percent after earnings of nine cents per share excluding restructuring costs bested forecasts of five cents per share.

Intuitive Surgical, which works in robotic-assisted surgery, projected that first-quarter revenues would be $465 million, compared with $611 million a year ago. The company also announced a charge of $67 million to settle product liability claims against the company. Shares slumped 6.8 percent.

Bond prices were mixed. The yield on the 10-year US Treasury held steady at 2.68 percent, the same level as Tuesday. The yield on the 30-year rose to 3.57 percent from 3.54 percent. Bond prices and yields move inversely.