[New York Stock Exchange] US-Iran Agreement Nears... S&P 500 Sets Another Record High

Nasdaq Closes Higher for 11 Consecutive Sessions

New York Stock Exchange. New York (USA) – Special Correspondent Yunju Hwang

U.S. President Donald Trump suggested over the weekend that a second ceasefire summit could take place, saying he was close to reaching an agreement with Iran. As a result, on April 16 (local time), all three major U.S. stock indices closed higher. The S&P 500 index once again hit a new all-time high, following the previous day's record, while the Nasdaq finished with gains for the 11th consecutive trading session.

At the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE), the Dow Jones Industrial Average closed at 48,578.72, up 115.00 points (0.24%) from the previous session. The large-cap-focused S&P 500 index rose 18.33 points (0.26%) to finish at 7,041.28, and the tech-heavy Nasdaq index jumped 86.687 points (0.36%) to close at 24,102.704.

On this day, the market cheered on expectations that a ceasefire was imminent. Although the market turned lower early in the session after U.S. Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth commented that "if an agreement is not reached, combat operations will resume," it rebounded following news of a ceasefire between Israel and Lebanon.

President Trump announced on social media that Israel and Lebanon had agreed to a 10-day ceasefire starting April 16. After this news, investment sentiment in the market improved once again. Most decisively, before departing for Las Vegas, Nevada, President Trump's remarks at the White House—stating that significant progress had been made in negotiations with Iran and that an agreement was very close—further drove the indices higher.

Following the suggestion that a second ceasefire summit could be held this weekend, the S&P 500 index hit another record high, and the Nasdaq also marked its 11th consecutive day of gains. The S&P 500 and Nasdaq indices had each surpassed the 7,000 and 24,000 marks, respectively, just the previous day, setting new records.

However, market experts noted that volatility could increase due to the potential economic impact following a ceasefire.

Rob Williams, Chief Investment Strategist at Sage Advisory, said, "We will have to endure several quarters of lackluster gross domestic product (GDP) growth," and added, "While the ceasefire can be a major positive factor, the current economic growth rate still remains at around 2%. For the next few quarters, it is highly likely that growth will stay below 2%."

Major large-cap stocks closed mixed. Notable changes included Nvidia down 0.47%, Apple down 1.01%, Microsoft up 2.06%, Amazon up 0.30%, Alphabet down 0.28%, Broadcom up 0.45%, Meta up 0.08%, and TSMC down 3.12%.

Sebastian Boyd, a macro strategist at Markets Live, told Bloomberg, "Just because stock prices are hitting all-time highs does not mean risk has returned to January levels," and added, "It seems investors are not fully reflecting how much riskier the global economy has become."

Meanwhile, international oil prices closed higher. On the New York Mercantile Exchange, West Texas Intermediate (WTI) crude for May delivery settled at $94.69 per barrel, up 3.7% from the previous session. On the ICE Futures Exchange, Brent crude for June delivery finished at $99.39 per barrel, up 4.7% from the previous session.

Currently, the yield on the 2-year U.S. Treasury note stands at 3.780%, up 1.4 basis points (1bp=0.01 percentage point) from the previous session, while the yield on the 10-year U.S. Treasury note is at 4.316%, up 3.8 basis points from the previous session.

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.