U.S. stocks were higher in afternoon trade on Wednesday as the market built on a positive start to 2023 and as traders looked ahead to Thursday’s inflation report which may determine the size of the Federal Reserve’s next interest rate hike in February.How are stock indexes trading
The S&P 500
SPX,
+1.01%
was up 36 points, or 0.9%, to 3,955
The Dow Jones Industrial Average
DJIA,
+0.63%
rose 198 points, or 0.6%, to 33,901
The Nasdaq Composite
COMP,
+6.15%
gained 133 points, or 1.2%, to 10,875
On Tuesday, the Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 186 points, or 0.56%, to 33704; the S&P 500 increased 27 points, or 0.7%, to 3919; and the Nasdaq Composite gained 107 points, or 1.01%, to 10743.
What’s driving markets U.S. stocks saw modest gains Wednesday with traders eyeing looming inflation data which is due out Thursday morning. Economists polled by Dow Jones expect December’s inflation report will show headline inflation remains unchanged from the previous month, or 6.5% year over year. The core price measure that strips out volatile food and fuel costs, is expected to rise 0.3% from November, or 5.7% year over year. See: Why Thursday’s U.S. CPI report might kill stock market’s hope of inflation melting away Investors will be looking for more evidence that inflation, which touched 9.1% in June and dipped to 7.1% in November, is continuing to slip and may allow the Federal Reserve to ease monetary policy soon. “It’s been pretty clear for several months now that goods inflation is slowing,” said Scott Ladner, chief investment officer at Horizon Investments. “The services side of inflation is really where everyone’s gonna be focused on,” according to Ladner. “Anything from any data we can get out of the services side of the month over month inflation, is where we’re going to be making an assessment,” Ladner told MarketWatch in a phone interview. Robert Conzo, CEO and managing director of The Wealth Alliance, thinks stock-market investors are “micromanaging a data set” and trying their best to pull out a trend out of it. “We’re starting to see a downward trend in inflation, especially the year-over-year numbers, and when that trend becomes clear, the Fed is gonna take his foot off the gas a bit, and the market is going to be happy,” he said via phone on Wednesday. Still, Fed officials remain resolute in stressing they …