NEW YORK — The U.S. stock market is ticking toward records after an easing of oil prices let Wall Street turn its focus back to the big profits that companies keep producing. The S&P 500 rose 0.6% early Tuesday and was flirting with its all-time high set at the end of last week. The Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 269 points, and the Nasdaq composite rose 0.7%. Stocks got a boost after oil prices gave back some of their big jumps from Monday. Brent crude fell 2.2%. DuPont rose after the chemical giant led another cavalcade of companies reporting better-than-expected profits.
THIS IS A BREAKING NEWS UPDATE. AP’s earlier story follows below.
Wall Street rebounded and oil prices retreated early Tuesday despite an exchange of fire between the U.S. and Iran near the Strait of Hormuz.
Futures for the S&P 500 rose 0.3%, while futures for the Dow Jones Industrial Average inched up 0.1%. Nasdaq futures climbed 0.5%.
Tensions in the Middle East escalated when the United Arab Emirates, a U.S. ally, said it came under attack from Iran for the first time since the ceasefire last month.
The fragile ceasefire between the U.S. and Iran was tested after the U.S. military said it had sank six Iranian small boats targeting civilian ships, while two U.S.-flagged ships successfully passed through the Strait of Hormuz as part of U.S. President Donald Trump’s “Project Freedom” plan under which the United States attempts to guide stranded ships through the strait.
The key waterway for oil and gas transport remains largely closed despite repeated demands from the U.S. for Iran to reopen the strait and as the United States imposed a sea blockade on Iranian ports.
“We are seeing the first signs of the ceasefire between the U.S. and Iran breaking down amid a re-escalation in the Persian Gulf,” ING Bank analysts Warren Patterson and Ewa Manthey wrote in a note Tuesday.
“Continuation of ‘Project Freedom’ risks further escalation,” they wrote. “Any relief from stranded vessels making their way through the Strait will be temporary, with very few inbound vessels moving into the Persian Gulf.”
Oil prices came back down slightly after surging on Monday.
Brent crude, the international standard, fell $1.14 to $113.30 per barrel. Before the war began in late February, it was trading near $70. Benchmark U.S. crude slipped $1.84 to $104.58 per barrel.
Outside of the war, markets are focused on the U.S. earnings season.
Pinterest soared 17.5% after the online bulletin board topped Wall Street’s first-quarter sales and profit targets as its active monthly users jumped 11% to 631 million. It was the tenth straight quarter of double-digit user growth for the San Francisco company.
Budweiser maker Anheuser-Busch Inbev also topped analyst sales and profit forecasts on strong beer sales. Its shares jumped more than 6% in premarket.
Coinbase jumped 3.6% after the cryptocurrency trading platform said in a regulatory filing that it was letting go of 700 employees, about 14% of its workforce.
Elsewhere, in Europe at midday, Britain’s FTSE 100 fell 1.2%, France’s CAC 40 was up 0.5%, and Germany’s DAX gained 1.2%.
Asian regional trading was thin, with markets in Japan, South Korea and mainland China closed for holidays.
Hong Kong’s Hang Seng fell 0.8% to 25,898.61, while Taiwan’s Taiex gained 0.2%.
Australia’s S&P/ASX 200 lost 0.2% to 8,680.50 after the central bank raised its benchmark interest rate to 4.35%, saying conflict in the Middle East had sharply increased fuel and commodity prices that were already adding to inflation. The cash rate hike on Tuesday was the Reserve Bank of Australia’s third quarter percentage point rise this year.
The bank said Australia’s inflation for the year through March was 4.6%. The bank manipulates interest rates to steer inflation toward a target band of 2% to 3%.
India’s Sensex lost 0.4%.
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Associated Press writer Rod McGuirk contributed.
