NEW YORK — Stocks are drifting on Wall Street Thursday, as oil prices jump after U.S. President Donald Trump announced “massive” new sanctions on Russia’s crude industry.
The S&P 500 added 0.1 per cent in early trading and crept a bit closer to its all-time high set earlier this month. The Dow Jones Industrial Average was up 19 points, or less than 0.1 per cent, as of 9:35 a.m. Eastern time, and the Nasdaq composite was virtually unchanged.
Tesla weighed on the market after reporting a weaker profit for the latest quarter than analysts expected, even though its revenue rose more than forecast. The electric-vehicle company’s stock fell 5.1 per cent.
IBM dropped 5.5 per cent despite reporting better profit and revenue than analysts expected. Wall Street focused instead on weaker-than-expected results for its Red Hat business, which provides open-source software products.
The strongest action was in the oil market, where the price for a barrel of benchmark U.S. crude climbed 4.9 per cent to $61.35. The move came after Trump announced sanctions against Russian oil giants Rosneft and Lukoil, in hopes of convincing Russia’s president, Vladimir Putin, to end the brutal war with Ukraine.
Sanctions could constrict the global flow of oil, and the price of Brent crude, the international standard, rose 4.8 per cent to $65.63 per barrel. The jumps helped oil prices recover some of their sharp recent losses, taken because of expectations for supplies of crude in inventories to remain plentiful. Oil prices are still down more than 10 per cent for the year so far.
Thursday’s gains for oil helped lift stocks of U.S. energy companies. Exxon Mobil added 1 per cent, and Chevron rose 0.7 per cent.
Other winners on Wall Street included Dow, which jumped 10.7 per cent, and Las Vegas Sands, which rallied 9.1 per cent. Both reported better results for the latest quarter than analysts expected.
The pressure is on companies broadly to deliver solid growth in profits. That would counter criticism that their stock prices shot too high following a 35 per cent romp for the S&P 500 from a low in April.
Molina Healthcare lost more than a fifth of its value and tumbled 21.8 per cent after its profit for the latest quarter fell well short of analysts’ expectations. CEO Joseph Zubretsky cited a challenging environment for medical costs, and insurers across the industry have been warning about rising medical costs throughout the year.
In the gold market, prices rose to halt a sharp, 2-day slide. The price for an ounce climbed 2.4 per cent to rise back above $4,160 per ounce. It had dropped sharply from its record set earlier this week after momentum suddenly gave out following what’s been a stunning year. The price of gold has jumped 57.5 per cent so far in 2025.
In stock markets abroad, indexes were mixed across Asia and Europe.
Stocks rose 0.7 per cent in Hong Kong and 0.2 per cent in Shanghai as leaders in Beijing wrapped up an important Communist Party meeting to set the agenda for the coming five years. The party said afterward that it will focus on speeding up self-reliance in science and technology.
Japan’s Nikkei 225 dropped 1.4 per cent, and South Korea’s Kospi sank 1 per cent for two of the world’s larger losses.
In the bond market, the yield on the 10-year Treasury edged up to 3.98 per cent from 3.97 per cent late Wednesday.
By Stan Choe, The Associated Press
AP Writers Teresa Cerojano and Matt Ott contributed.
