Stock market today: Dow starts week on solid footing ahead of key inflation data

Investing.com -- The Dow closed higher Monday, rebounding from a slip last week as investors awaited key economic data due later this week expected to show a slowdown in inflation ahead of the Federal Reserve's monetary policy meeting later this month.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average gained 0.6%, or 209 points, the Nasdaq fell 0.2%, and the S&P 500 rose 0.2%.

Inflation in June expected to slow, but Fed likely will lift rates

Consumer and wholesale inflation reports due Wednesday and Thursday, respectively, are expected to show that monthly price pressures picked up pace in June, but slowed on an annualized basis.

Signs of a slowdown in inflation, however, aren't likely to avert the Fed from resuming rate hikes later this month, UBS says, as inflation continues to trend above the Fed’s 2% target.

“We expect a notable slowing in core CPI to be reported next week. That said, we think after today's data, the FOMC remains on track for a July rate hike,” UBS added.

About 92% of traders expect the Fed to hike rates later month, according to Investing.com’s Fed Rate Monitor Tool.

Big Tech takes breather; Meta steady as Threads trend

Big tech swung lower, pressured by a more than 2% slip in Alphabet Inc (NASDAQ:GOOGL) and a 1.6% drop in Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ:MSFT), but Meta Platforms Inc (NASDAQ:META) held gains to end the day up 1% as its Threads app, a Twitter rival, surpassed 100 million sign-ups within just five days after its launch.

The signs of early momentum in Threads come just as data flagged slowing user traffic on Twitter.

Web traffic to Twitter dropped 5% for the first two full days since Threads was launched, compared with the prior week, according to Similarweb (NYSE:SMWB), a web analytics company.

Big movers: Carvana, Novavax

Carvana Co (NYSE:CVNA), up more than 500% year to date, continued to bring the pain to short sellers of the stock as the online used car retailer surged 16% after announcing that growing demand for electric vehicles is likely to bolster growth.

About 60% of its shares are shorted, making Carvana one of the most shorted stocks on Wall Street.

Novavax (NASDAQ:NVAX), meanwhile, racked up a 29% gain after the biotech company said Friday that it expected to receive a $350M funding boost from Canada for unused vaccines.