US STOCKS-Wall Street ends higher, lifted by Uber, Lyft and Nvidia

Wall Street ended higher on Wednesday as ride-hailing platforms Lyft and Uber rallied, while Nvidia displaced Alphabet as the U.S. stock market's third most valuable company. Nvidia overtook Alphabet's market capitalization ahead of the dominant AI chipmaker's quarterly results next week. Uber surged to a record high, boosted by a $7 billion share buyback plan.

Lyft soared after its profit beat estimates and it said it would generate positive free cash flow for the first time in 2024. Helping lift the S&P 500, Meta Platforms and Tesla both gained.

According to preliminary data, the S&P 500 gained 47.34 points, or 0.95%, to end at 5,000.13 points, while the Nasdaq Composite gained 202.43 points, or 1.30%, to 15,859.15. The Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 145.33 points, or 0.38%, to 38,418.61. Wall Street indexes slumped to over one-week lows on Tuesday and the blue-chip Dow posted its worst day in 11 months, after data showed core consumer prices in January stayed at nearly double the Fed's 2% target, forcing investors to reassess their rate cut expectations.

"Regardless of when that first cut is, I think the market should fear what the Fed fears. What the Fed fears is cutting too soon and having to raise rates. That would be catastrophic for this rally,” said Jake Dollarhide, Chief Executive Officer of Longbow Asset Management in Tulsa, Oklahoma. Providing some relief, Chicago Fed President Austan Goolsbee said the path back to the central bank's 2% inflation target would still be on track even if price increases run a bit hotter-than-expected over the next few months.

Expectations the Fed will cut interest this year have fueled a rally on Wall Street in recent months that has sent the S&P 500 to record highs. Interest rate futures suggest traders mostly expect the Fed to begin cutting rates by its June policy meeting, the CME FedWatch tool showed.

Robinhood Markets rallied following a surprise fourth-quarter profit. Crypto stocks Coinbase, Marathon Digital and Riot surged over as bitcoin's market value crossed $1 trillion for the first time since Nov. 21.

(This story has not been edited by Devdiscourse staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)