Wall Street surges after Amazon's strong quarterly results

Friday's session on Wall Street saw a return to growth after a brief pause, with investors focusing on Amazon's better-than-expected quarterly results. Major US stock indexes ended the week and October in the black.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average closed up 0.09 percent and reached 47,562.87 points.

At the end of the day, the S&P 500 rose by 0.26 percent and reached 6,840.20 points.

The Nasdaq Composite rose 0.61 percent to 23,724.98 points.

The Russell 2000 mid-cap index rose 0.54 percent to 2,479.38 points.

The VIX index is up 3.13 percent to 17.44 points.

Friday capped a strong week and month on Wall Street. The S&P 500 gained 0.7% this week, while the Nasdaq and Dow Jones advanced 2.2% and 0.8%, respectively.

The entire month of October – which has historically seen some of the largest single-day declines in stock market history – saw the S&P 500 rise 2.3%. The Nasdaq rose 4.7% for the month, and the 30-company Dow Jones Industrial Average gained 2.5%. The Dow Jones Industrial Average posted its sixth consecutive month of gains, the first such streak since 2018.

The Magnificent Seven, an index of major US technology companies, is expected to post its seventh consecutive month of gains, tying the second-longest streak on record from two years ago. A record 11 consecutive months of gains were recorded for these companies in 2016-17.

The Nasdaq is on track for its seventh consecutive monthly gain, its longest streak since May 2017. The S&P 500 and blue-chip Dow are heading for their sixth straight month of gains.

"Big tech companies drive the stock market, so if this group starts to slide, it will drag the entire market down with it. At the same time, their results brought a lot of relief, as before the season there were concerns about what their reports would look like after the recent record-breaking gains," says Matt Maley, chief strategist at Miler Tabak.

Amazon shares rose nearly 10% after the e-commerce giant reported that revenue from its cloud computing division rose 20% in the third quarter, exceeding Wall Street estimates.

The company's CEO, Andy Jassy, ​​said the AWS segment is "growing at a pace we haven't seen since 2022," with artificial intelligence and underlying infrastructure enjoying "strong" demand.

"AI adoption is accelerating, making business investments in Gemini's growing computing power and functionality worthwhile. This will be a key indicator going forward, as we have budgeted over $600 billion in capital expenditures for next year," Brian Mulberry, client portfolio manager at Zacks Investment Management, told CNBC.

Wall Street investors also bought shares of other AI-related companies on Friday following Amazon's earnings results. AI software company Palantir rose 3 percent, while leading AI player Oracle gained 2.2 percent.

“Investors will be paying attention to how this spending translates into growing AI sales for individual companies,” Mulberry said.

Apple shares remained largely unchanged after a mixed quarterly report: the company's revenue beat expectations, but its results were weighed down by problems with its iPhone supply chain. In recent months, the company's market capitalization has increased by $1 trillion.

Shares of streaming giant Netflix rose 2.7% after it announced a 10-for-1 stock split.

Electric car maker Tesla also gained value, rising more than 3% by the end of the day.

In the oil market, WTI futures for November are up 0.54 percent to $60.90 per barrel, while December Brent futures are up 0.11 percent to $65.07 per barrel. (PAP) Business)

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