Nasdaq, S&P 500 crawl higher on Amazon, Apple boost; Dow remains muted

The S&P 500 and the Nasdaq edged higher on Tuesday, led by a bounce in shares of Amazon.com and Apple, while uncertainty over more US fiscal stimulus kept trading in Dow constituents muted.

Amazon.com Inc jumped 2.2% after Bernstein upgraded its stock to “outperform”, saying the company will continue to receive a boost from premium subscribers and third-party merchants even beyond the pandemic.

Microsoft Corp, Apple Inc, Alphabet Inc and Facebook Inc, which together fuelled a Wall Street rally since a coronavirus-driven crash in March, rose between 0.3% and 0.9% in early deals.

Seven of the 11 major S&P 500 indexes were trading higher, with real estate and consumer discretionary leading gains.