US STOCKS-S&P 500 and Nasdaq close at highest since April 2022

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12/06/2023 21:00

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      Fed expected to hold rates this week 
    

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      Consumer prices data for May due on Tuesday
    

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      Nasdaq Inc slides on Adenza buyout deal 
    

  
 (Updated with market close at 1600 ET (2000 GMT))
    By Noel Randewich and Shristi  Achar A
       June 12 (Reuters) - The S&P 500 and the Nasdaq rallied
on Monday to their highest closing levels since April 2022,
while Oracle hit a record high ahead of quarterly results as
investors awaited inflation data and the Federal Reserve's
interest rate decision this week. 
    Lifted by gains in market heavyweights including increases
in both Amazon  AMZN.O  and Tesla  TSLA.O , the S&P 500 has now
recovered over 20% from its October 2022 lows. Some investors
say Wall Street is the midst of a bull market.
    "The further out the October lows get in the rear view
mirror, the more confident investors become. Have investors
become more complacent? They probably have, and that's actually
a good sign," said Jake Dollarhide, chief executive officer of
Longbow Asset Management in Tulsa, Oklahoma.
    Tesla has now climbed for 12 straight trading sessions, a
record for the electric car maker.
        According to preliminary data, the S&P 500
 .SPX  gained 40.33 points, or 0.94%, to end at 4,339.19 points,
while the Nasdaq Composite  .IXIC  gained 202.78 points, or
1.53%, to 13,461.92. The Dow Jones Industrial Average
 .DJI  rose 190.47 points, or 0.56%, to 34,067.25.
        
  
    
    The U.S. Labor Department's consumer price index reading on
Tuesday is expected to show inflation cooled slightly in May,
with core prices likely remaining sticky. Tuesday is also first
day of the Fed's two-day meeting.     
    Traders see a 76% chance of the central bank holding rates
at the 5%-5.25% range on Wednesday, while pricing in a 71%
chance of a rate hike in July, according to the CME Fedwatch
tool. 
    "There's a chance that the Fed will stay data dependent. So
we don't necessarily think that a rate hike is off the table in
the future, but for the near term we just see them staying
steady," said Dylan Kremer, co-chief investment officer of
Certuity.  
    A rally in megacap stocks, better-than-expected quarterly
earnings and hopes that the Fed might be nearing the end of its
monetary tightening cycle have lifted indexes in recent weeks. 
    The rally has recently widened to include more economically
sensitive sectors such as energy and industrials, as well as
small-cap stocks, as data continues to show a resilient U.S.
economy despite higher interest rates.
    Goldman Sachs on Friday raised its year-end price target for
the benchmark S&P 500  .SPX  to 4,500 from 4,000, citing the
broadening of the market rally.
    The CBOE volatility index  .VIX  edged up to about 14.8, its
highest since last Tuesday.
    Oracle  ORCL.N  jumped as much as 7% to an all-time high
after J.P. Morgan hiked its price target ahead of the cloud and
enterprise software firm's fourth-quarter results later in the
day. 
    Nasdaq Inc  NDAQ.O  slumped after the exchange operator said
it would buy software firm Adenza for $10.5 billion, which
analysts called an expensive bet.
    Biogen  BIIB.O  rose after a U.S. FDA panel of advisers
unanimously backed its Alzheimer's drug, Leqembi, raising
expectations that a traditional approval for the treatment might
not come with major new safety warnings.
    Broadcom Inc  AVGO.O  jumped after Reuters reported  the
chipmaker was set to gain conditional EU antitrust approval for
its $61 billion proposed acquisition of cloud computing firm
VMware  VMW.N . That helped lift the Philadelphia semiconductor
index  .SOX , bringing its gain in 2023 to over 40%.

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Trading in the S&P 500    https://tmsnrt.rs/3WZPOtB
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 (Reporting by Shristi Achar A and Sruthi Shankar in Bengaluru
and by Noel Randewich in Oakland, Calif.
Editing by Vinay Dwivedi, Sriraj Kalluvila and David Gregorio)
 ((noel.randewich@tr.com; Twitter: @randewich))