Traders work on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange at the opening bell, in New York, May 27, 2026.
Angela Weiss | Afp | Getty Images
The Dow Jones Industrial Average advanced nearly 300 points Wednesday to a new record as oil prices retreated.
The S&P 500 ticked 0.07% lower as a decline in cybersecurity stocks kept gains in check, while the Nasdaq Composite slipped 0.25%. Consumer products giant Procter & Gamble jumped more than 3% and Home Depot advanced more than 2%, lifting the 30-stock Dow.
Shares of Zscaler tanked more than 30% after the cloud security company issued disappointing revenue guidance for the current quarter. Palo Alto Networks declined more than 2% and CrowdStrike dropped about 4% in sympathy. The Global X Cybersecurity ETF (BUG) also lost more than 4%.
A decline in oil prices lent the market some support. U.S. crude oil fell more than 3% to below $91 a barrel after Iran’s state TV said the country is committed to restoring commercial traffic through the Strait of Hormuz to pre-war levels within one month, according to Reuters.
The White House, however, denied the Iranian state media report as a “complete fabrication.”
Micron, which surged 19% on Tuesday to top $1 trillion in market capitalization for the first time, was up less than 1%. In the prior session, the stock soared on a bullish report from UBS, which said the stock could more than double from here because of long-term agreements being signed by memory suppliers to fuel AI implementation. Investors have shifted to memory chip makers as their favorite way to play the AI bull market. Micron’s South Korean peer SK Hynix hit a $1 trillion market value as well overnight.
A rally in the technology sector drove both the broad market index and tech-heavy Nasdaq to fresh intraday and closing highs in the previous session. The S&P 500 added 0.61%, while the Nasdaq popped 1.19%. On the other hand, the blue-chip Dow shed 118.02 points, or 0.23%.
Investors were also encouraged by messages from President Donald Trump indicating that talks with Iran to end the war were “proceeding nicely.” While the U.S. conducted “self defense” strikes in southern Iran early Tuesday, Central Command spokesman Tim Hawkins said that the U.S. used “restraint during the ongoing ceasefire” between the two nations.
Hopes of easing Iran tensions, alongside a strong earnings season, have propelled stocks to a record this month. But Drew Pettit, U.S. equity strategist at Citi, doesn’t see much more room for stocks to run from here.
“You got yields higher, like 4.50% on the [U.S. 10-year Treasury] , and you have inflation expectations higher in a curve that’s actually gotten flatter throughout the year. All of that doesn’t set you up for a higher sustainable multiple at this point,” he said on CNBC’s “Power Lunch” on Tuesday afternoon.
Pettit’s 7,700 year-end target for the S&P 500 implies a modest increase of just 2% for the index.
Goldman Sachs disagrees, raising their year-end S&P 500 target to 8,000 from 7,600 late Tuesday on the notion that earnings growth will continue to be strong even with some geopolitical headwinds.
