Stock market today: Wall Street drifts to more records after Chinese stocks soar

NEW YORK (AP) — U.S. stocks drifted to more records Tuesday after Chinese stocks soared following a slew of moves by the Chinese central bank to prop up the world’s second-largest economy.

The S&P 500 rose 0.3% to set an all-time high for the 41st time this year. The movements were tentative, though, and the index wavered up and down following a surprisingly weak report released in the morning on confidence among U.S. consumers.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average added 83 points, or 0.2%, to its own record set the day before, while the Nasdaq composite gained 0.6%.

Financial markets have been mostly ebullient after the Federal Reserve made a drastic turn last week in how it sets interest rates. It’s now lowering rates to make things easier for the U.S. economy after keeping them high for years in hopes of extinguishing high inflation.

One of the risks still hanging over the market is the struggling Chinese economy and how much its flagging growth may affect the rest of the world. After earlier delivering some modest and piecemeal moves, the chief of China’s central bank on Tuesday announced a broad set of changes to bolster its economy, including a reduction in the amount of reserves banks are required to keep.

Analysts called the coordinated moves encouraging, and they helped stocks soar in China. Indexes jumped 4.2% in Shanghai and 4.1% in Hong Kong. But questions still remain about how much they will boost the economy, which has been struggling since Chinese authorities cracked down on excessive borrowing by property developers.

Prices climbed for crude oil and other commodities that a healthy Chinese economy would devour. Copper rose 3.3%.

Another risk hanging over Wall Street is the slowing U.S. job market. Now that inflation has eased substantially from its peak two summers ago, the main worry occupying investors is that a slowdown in hiring by U.S. companies may worsen.

Moves to interest rates can take a notoriously long time to make their way fully through the economy, and the Federal Reserve kept its main interest rate at a two-decade high for more than a year before last week. It did cut by an unusually large amount in hopes of providing relief to the job market and economy.

A report released Tuesday showed U.S. households are feeling more worried about the job market. Their overall confidence level sank in September, according to the Conference Board, instead of rising like economists expected. That’s a big deal because spending by U.S. consumers is the heart of the U.S. economy.

AutoZone’s stock slipped 0.2% after the seller of auto replacement parts and accessories said a key measure of its sales performance among its U.S. stores barely grew during the latest quarter. It was part of an underwhelming report where its profit and revenue both fell short of analysts’ expectations.

AutoZone said it’s continuing to see customers at its U.S. stores delay purchases of non-essentials.

Another company that depends on the appetite of U.S. shoppers for non-essentials, Thor Industries, rose 6.1% following a mixed profit report. The maker of recreational vehicles reported better profit and revenue for the latest quarter than analysts expected, but it also gave a forecast for its upcoming fiscal year that sees the RV market continuing to be challenged.

“The talk of a softer market is beginning to sound like a broken record, but we remained focused on managing through it with increasing efficiency,” CEO Bob Martin said.

One of Wall Street’s bigger winners was Smartsheet, which helps companies manage projects and automate workflows. It rose 6.5% after Blackstone and Vista Equity Partners agreed to buy it in an all-cash deal valued at $8.4 billion.

In the bond market, Treasury yields slipped following the weaker-than-expected report on consumer confidence. The 10-year yield fell to 3.73%, from 3.75% late Monday. The two-year yield, which more closely tracks expectations for the Fed’s upcoming moves, fell to 3.53% from 3.59% late Monday.

Yields sank as traders upped their forecasts for how much the Federal Reserve will cut interest rates by at its next meeting in November. They’re now betting on a nearly 61% probability of another bigger-than-usual cut of half a percentage point. That’s up from a 53% probability the day before, according to data from CME Group.

Wall Street loves lower interest rates because they can give the economy a boost by making it less expensive to borrow money to buy a car, house or things on credit cards. They also tend to give a boost to prices for all kinds of investments.

Nvidia’s jump of 4% was the strongest force lifting the S&P 500 index Tuesday. The chip company’s stock had sunk 27% during the summer on worries that its price had shot too high in the frenzy around artificial-intelligence technology. But lower rates dampen that criticism by a bit, and Nvidia has been rallying back since early August.

All told, the S&P 500 rose 14.36 points to 5,732.93. The Dow added 83.57 to 42,208.22, and the Nasdaq composite gained 100.25 to 18,074.52.

In stock markets abroad, indexes rose across much of Europe and Asia. France’s CAC 40 jumped 1.3%, South Korea’s Kospi rose 1.1% and Japan’s Nikkei 225 added 0.6%.

AP Business Writers Elaine Kurtenbach and Matt Ott contributed.

The New York Stock Exchange is shown on Tuesday, Sept. 24, 2024, in New York. (AP Photo/Peter Morgan)

The flag of Argentina flies on the front of the New York Stock Exchange where Argentine President Javier Milei will ring the opening bell on Monday, Sept. 23, 2024, in New York. (AP Photo/Peter Morgan)

People walk in front of an electronic stock board showing Japan's Nikkei index at a securities firm Tuesday, Sept. 24, 2024, in Tokyo. (AP Photo/Eugene Hoshiko)

The Tokyo Stock Exchange building is seen Tuesday, Sept. 24, 2024, in Tokyo. (AP Photo/Eugene Hoshiko)

The Tokyo Stock Exchange building is seen Tuesday, Sept. 24, 2024, in Tokyo. (AP Photo/Eugene Hoshiko)

A person walks in front of an electronic stock board showing New York Dow, Japan's Nikkei indexes and U.S. dollar/Japanese yen exchange rate at a securities firm Tuesday, Sept. 24, 2024, in Tokyo. (AP Photo/Eugene Hoshiko)

A person walks near an electronic stock board showing Japan's Nikkei index at a securities firm Tuesday, Sept. 24, 2024, in Tokyo. (AP Photo/Eugene Hoshiko)

A person looks at an electronic stock board showing Japan's Nikkei index at a securities firm Tuesday, Sept. 24, 2024, in Tokyo. (AP Photo/Eugene Hoshiko)

The nation’s largest owner of single-family homes for rent has agreed to pay $48 million to settle claims by the Federal Trade Commission that it reaped millions of dollars via deceptive business practices, including forcing tenants to pay undisclosed fees on top of their monthly rent.

Under the terms of the proposed settlement, Invitation Homes also agreed to ensure it is clearly disclosing its leasing prices, establish procedures to handle tenant security-deposit refunds fairly and cease other unlawful practices, the FTC said Tuesday.

In the complaint, filed in federal court in Atlanta, the FTC claims that the Dallas-based company used “deceptive advertising and unfair practices” to charge millions of dollars in bogus fees that harmed tens of thousands of people.

These mandatory fees, charged for internet packages, air-filter delivery and other services, were not disclosed in the monthly rental rates that Invitation Homes advertised, the FTC claims.

All told, the company charged consumers tens of millions of dollars in junk fees as part of their monthly rental payments between 2021 and June 2023, the FTC alleges.

The agency also claims that Invitation Homes “systematically withheld” tenants’ security deposits after they moved out, unfairly charging them for normal wear-and-tear, and used “unfair eviction practices,” including starting eviction proceedings against renters who had already moved out.

The funds from the settlement, which is subject to approval by a federal judge, would go toward customer refunds.

Invitation Homes did not immediately return a request for comment.

As of June 30, the company owned or managed more than 109,000 homes across the U.S.

Shares in Invitation Homes were down 2% in afternoon trading Tuesday.

FILE - The Federal Trade Commission building on Jan. 28, 2015, in Washington. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon, File)