雅虎香港電視

STORY: Wall Street's major indexes ended higher on Friday as investors flocked back to Big Tech stocks that had triggered broad sell-offs earlier in the week.

The Dow climbed more than 1.6%, and the S&P 500 and Nasdaq both closed just above 1%.

Five members of the so-called Magnificent Seven rose on Friday, led by Meta Platforms, which climbed more than 2.5%.

The two exceptions were Tesla and Alphabet, whose lackluster earnings had triggered Wednesday's big market sell-off.

With further Magnificent Seven earnings due next week, the immediate outlook for markets may hinge on what type of results these companies deliver.

Anna Rathbun is chief investment officer at CBIZ Investment Advisory Services.

"I think what's behind this is there is this expectation from the investors saying, 'OK, we've given you AI-related hype for now over a year. We want to start seeing some quantitative metrics on the ROI of these billions of dollars you're putting into AI, and Alphabet didn't deliver that, right?' [FLASH] So for next week we have other stocks and other companies that are investing in AI. If investors have the same expectations, we may be looking at a similar type of disappointment if they don't deliver any quantitative metrics."

Among other stock movers, Deckers Outdoor jumped more than 6% after it raised its annual profit forecast.

Norfolk Southern soared nearly 11%, its largest one-day percentage gain since March 2020, after the rail operator reported second-quarter profit above Wall Street estimates thanks to robust pricing.

And medical device maker Dexcom slumped more than 40% after cutting its annual revenue forecast.

Data on Friday showed a moderate rise in U.S. prices, which underlined cooling inflation.

Investors will now look to the Federal Reserve for possible signals of a September rate cut when the central bank holds its latest two-day policy meeting next week.