By Abigail Summerville and Sukriti Gupta
(Reuters) -The S&P 500 and the Nasdaq ended higher while the Dow closed lower after a choppy trading session on Thursday, as investors sifted through earnings reports and awaited Amazon’s results after the bell and a key jobs report on Friday.
Amazon.com (NASDAQ:AMZN) ticked up 1.1% ahead of its earnings report. The company beat expectations on quarterly revenue, but sales in its cloud computing unit came in below expectations. Investors are monitoring its artificial intelligence investments, after Chinese startup DeepSeek’s cheaper AI model sharpened investor scrutiny of the billions U.S. tech companies have spent developing the technology.
Nvidia rose 3.1%.
"Today, the main focus is corporate earnings. Tariffs are in the background," said Zachary Hill, head of portfolio management at Horizon Investments.
"The AI theme has been under quite a lot of volatility over the last few weeks with the DeepSeek news ... We’re watching tonight for any thoughts that (Amazon) has to say around that," Hill said.
Drugmaker Eli Lilly (NYSE:LLY) rose 3.3% after the company forecast annual profit largely above estimates, while fashion house Tapestry jumped 12% on an annual sales and profit forecast increase.
Philip Morris International (NYSE:PM) advanced 10.9% after the cigarette maker posted better-than-expected quarterly results and forecast 2025 profit above estimates.
Honeywell (NASDAQ:HON) fell 5.6% after the industrial and aerospace company said it would split into three independently listed companies and forecast downbeat sales and profit for 2025.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 125.65 points, or 0.28%, to 44,747.63, the S&P 500 gained 22.09 points, or 0.36%, to 6,083.57 and the Nasdaq Composite gained 99.66 points, or 0.51%, to 19,791.99.
Eight of the 11 S&P 500 sectors traded higher, with financial services and consumer staples leading gains, and energy stocks losing the most ground.
Markets saw a dismal start to the week when U.S. President Donald Trump announced sweeping trade tariffs over the weekend, but suspended the levies on goods from Mexico and Canada on Monday for a month.
The January nonfarm payrolls report is due on Friday, a crucial metric in gauging the state of the labor market and the Federal Reserve’s rate path.
Traders do not expect the Fed to make a move on interest rates in its next meeting in March, but a cut is widely anticipated in June, according to the CME’s FedWatch.
Data released on Thursday showed the number of Americans filing new applications for unemployment benefits increased moderately last week.
Elsewhere in corporate moves, Skyworks (NASDAQ:SWKS) Solutions plunged 24.7% after the Apple (NASDAQ:AAPL) supplier forecast declines in revenue in its mobile segment and projected current-quarter profits below estimates.
Qualcomm (NASDAQ:QCOM) fell 3.7% as the chip designer’s executives said its lucrative patent-licensing business would not see sales growth this year after a license agreement with Huawei Technologies expired.
Advancing issues outnumbered decliners by a 1.05-to-1 ratio on the New York Stock Exchange. There were 179 new highs and 55 new lows on the NYSE.
On the Nasdaq, 2,041 stocks rose and 2,287 fell as declining issues outnumbered advancers by a 1.12-to-1 ratio.
Volume on U.S. exchanges was 13.57 billion shares, compared with the 14.95-billion average for the full session over the last 20 trading days.