U.S. Stocks Climb on Better Than Expected Inflation Data

By Liz Moyer

Investing.com -- U.S. stocks rose Friday, with the Dow jumping on better-than-expected inflation data while the Nasdaq was weighed by disappointing earnings from Amazon.

At 10:37 ET (14:37 GMT), the Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 486 points or 1.5%, while the S&P 500 was up 1.1%, and the NASDAQ Composite was up 1.3%.

The Commerce Department’s inflation gauge, known as the personal consumption expenditures index, rose 5.1% in September, not including food and energy prices, against an expected 5.2% gain over the same month last year. For the month, core PCE rose 0.5%.

That comes hand in hand with data on personal income and spending that showed consumers continued to spend at a rate that outpaced the rise in prices.

Personal spending rose 0.6% for the month, faster than the price of the average shopping basket. The price index for personal consumer expenditures rose 0.3%. Personal income rose 0.4% in the month.

The PCE reading could ease investor fears that the Federal Reserve will continue on its aggressive interest rate hike path. Many see the possibility that the Fed, which is expected to raise rates another 0.75 percentage point next week, could start to ease off that pace when it next meets in December.

Tech stocks were initially weighed down by Amazon's (NASDAQ:AMZN) gloomy forecast for holiday quarter revenue, which it expects will take a hit from foreign exchange effects. Shares of Amazon fell 9.9% and hit a 52-week low.

Fellow tech giant Apple (NASDAQ:AAPL) had stronger earnings, beating expectations, but iPhone sales were slightly weaker than analysts were expecting. Shares of Apple rose 6.9%.

Oil fell. Crude Oil WTI Futures was down 1% to $88.09 a barrel, while Brent Oil Futures crude was down 1.1% to $93.98 a barrel. Gold Futures fell 1.3% to $1645.