NEW YORK (AP) — U.S. stocks are ticking higher after UnitedHealth Group and other big companies showed they’re making even bigger profits than analysts expected. Oil prices, meanwhile, remained relatively stable Tuesday as optimism seems to be sticking in financial markets that the United States and Iran will avoid a worst-case scenario for the economy, even with their war ongoing. The S&P 500 rose 0.1%, coming off just its second drop in 14 days,
and is close to another all-time high. The Dow Jones Industrial Average added 264 points, and the Nasdaq composite edged up less than 0.1%. Brent crude slipped 0.5%.
THIS IS A BREAKING NEWS UPDATE. AP’s earlier story follows below.
Wall Street followed global markets higher and oil prices were flat Tuesday as U.S.-Iran talks aimed at ending the war remained in doubt.
Futures for the S&P 500 rose 0.4% before the opening bell, while futures for the Dow Jones Industrial Average climbed 0.6%. Nasdaq futures gained 0.4%.
U.S. benchmark crude slipped 14 cents to $87.28 per barrel, while the price for a barrel of Brent crude, the international standard, is off 47 cents to $95.01.
The Iran war has disrupted oil shipments through the Strait of Hormuz, a vital waterway through which about a fifth of the global oil supply passes on a typical day, pushing energy sharply higher.
U.S. President Donald Trump has demanded that Tehran allow traffic to pass through the strait, which is on its southern border, and has imposed a blockade on Iranian ports.
Mohammed Bagher Qalibaf, Iran’s chief negotiator said his nation wouldn’t negotiate in the face of threats while U.S. President Donald Trump offered mixed messages about the path ahead for the Iran war.
Qalibaf, who is also Iran’s parliamentary speaker, wrote in a post on X early Tuesday that “We do not accept negotiations under the shadow of threats."
Trump indicated that he still expects to dispatch his negotiating team, led by U.S. Vice President JD Vance, to Pakistan’s capital of Islamabad for talks, even as Iran insisted it would not take part until the U.S. leader dialed back his demands. Trump said he’s “highly unlikely” to renew the ceasefire before it expires Wednesday.
“The current dynamic is one of a precarious balance of truce,” Mizuho Bank said in a commentary, so “as the ceasefire draws to its 2-week deadline, the all-consuming question is whether both sides can seize on the talks to land on a US-Iran deal that ends the war.”
For now, oil prices remain well below the $119 per barrel level for Brent crude when fears were at their highest. And the S&P 500 is still above where it was before the war.
In early equities trading, shares of Apple barely moved after the iPhone maker announced Monday night that CEO Tim Cook was stepping down from the job that he inherited from the late Steve Jobs.
Cook, 65, will turn the CEO duties over to Apple’s head of hardware engineering, John Ternus, on Sept. 1, ending a 15-year reign that saw the company’s market value soar by more than $3.6 trillion during an iPhone-fueled era of prosperity. Cook will remain involved with the tech giant, serving as its executive chairman.
UnitedHealth Group soared more than 7% in premarket after its first-quarter results came in ahead of Wall Street projections and the health care company raised its full-year profit outlook.
Markets will also have their eyes on Capitol Hill Tuesday, where Trump's nominee for the Federal Reserve Chair, Kevin Warsh, will appear at a hearing before the Senate Banking Committee.
Warsh, a former top official at the Fed and a wealthy investor, will likely face a range of tough questions at the hearing. Democrats on the committee have already signaled they will press him about what they argue is a lack of transparency regarding some of his vast financial holdings. It’s not clear when the committee may even be able to vote on his nomination.
Elsewhere, in Europe at midday, Germany's DAX rose 0.6% and the CAC 40 in Paris ticked up 0.2%. Britain's FTSE 100 was flat.
In Asian trading, Tokyo's Nikkei 225 climbed 0.9% to 59,349.17 on strong gains for tech-related companies like Tokyo Electron, which rose 3.5%. Tech and energy giant SoftBank Group Corp. gained 8.5%, part of the latest wave of gains pinned on expectations of windfalls from artificial intelligence.
South Korea's Kospi jumped 2.7% to 6,388.47, and Taiwan's Taiex advanced 1.8%.
The Hang Seng in Hong Kong gained 0.5% to 26,481.48 and the Shanghai Composite index added 0.1% to 4,085.08.
Australia's S&P/ASX 200 declined less than 0.1% to 8,949.40.
