Dow closes at record high, while tech stocks drag down S&P and Nasdaq

The Dow Jones Industrial Average closed at a record high on Monday as investors tried to move on from a steep sell-off earlier this month.

The 30-stock index closed up 65.44 points, or 0.16%, at 41,240.52. Earlier in the day, it climbed more than 200 points, or 0.6%, to set a new intraday record, then pulled back from that level. The S&P 500 slipped 0.32% to 5,616.84, while the Nasdaq Composite sank 0.85% to end the day at 17,725.76.

Traders also appeared to be rotating out of tech and into other areas of the market. The S&P 500 energy sector was up more than 1%, while tech fell 1%. Nvidia closed down 2.3% ahead of its earnings report due Wednesday afternoon, an event traders are harping on as key to the market and the artificial intelligence enthusiasm that has driven this bull market. Other chip stocks such as Broadcom and Micron were also lower.

“I think there’s a little angst in the technology sector about the upcoming Nvidia earnings,” Baird analyst Ross Mayfield told CNBC. “The market is in a pretty healthy place, but it is really hard to make big advances higher if tech is a laggard — it’s just too big of a weight in the index — and right now, it is acting like a laggard.”

The market kicked off August under pressure, as concerns over a possible recession, and the unwind of a popular hedge fund trade linked to the Japanese yen, pulled stocks off their record levels. The S&P 500 lost 3% on Aug. 5, its biggest one-day loss since 2022. The Dow also had its worst sell-off in about two years that day, plunging more than 1,000 points.

Since then, though, expectations of lower Federal Reserve interest rates and improving U.S. economic data have sent stocks soaring. The S&P 500 has surged 8% since Aug. 5 and was less than 1% away from its record high set in mid-July, while the Dow has soared more than 6%. The rebound has broadened out to the wider market, with the small-cap Russell 2000 also rising following Powell’s comments.

Stocks are coming off a strong week that was highlighted by comments from Fed Chair Jerome Powell that laid the groundwork for interest rate cuts. Wall Street has been anxiously awaiting a rate cut, especially in light of some worrying economic data that sparked a sell-off at the beginning of August and worried investors that elevated borrowing costs could damage the U.S. economy.

Powell did not indicate when, or by how much, interest rates would be potentially lowered. Traders remain unanimous in their forecast for a rate cut at the Fed’s September policy meeting, however, per the CME Group’s FedWatch Tool.

“We think they’ll do 25 basis points in September, November and December, because they want the market to know that they are not behind the curve, but at the same time, they want to ensure that they are not going to go too quickly into a cutting mode,” said Sam Stovall, chief investment strategist at CFRA Research.