US Stocks Continue Rally In Spite Of Oil Price Rise

Wall Street stocks rallied for a third straight session on Thursday despite a jump in oil prices as markets monitored developments in Ukraine and digested monetary tightening moves by central banks.

Petroleum-linked shares had a banner day as oil prices shot up more than eight percent on continued worry about lost crude production from Russia following its invasion of Ukraine.

Higher oil prices usually weigh on the broader equity market, but stocks continued to benefit from positive momentum, analysts said.

Hopes for peace negotiations were dampened following the Russian bombing of a Ukrainian theatre sheltering many civilians, but planned talks between the leaders of the United States and China raised investors' hopes.

"Wall Street is eagerly awaiting to see what happens with President (Joe) Biden's call with President Xi (Jinping)," said Oanda's Edward Moya.

"If the US can have China refrain from providing support to the Russians, investors may grow more optimistic that an end to this war could happen much sooner."

The Dow Jones Industrial Average finished up 1.2 percent at 34,480.76, its third straight session of adding more than one percent.

The broad-based S&P 500 also climbed 1.2 percent to 4,411.67, while the tech-rich Nasdaq Composite Index advanced 1.3 percent to 13,614.78.

The Bank of England hiked its main interest rate to its pre-pandemic level of 0.75 percent, the third increase in a row.

The move comes a day after the Federal Reserve announced its first interest rate hike since 2018 in a bid to counter runaway inflation.

Among individual companies, Williams-Sonoma won 5.4 percent and Dollar General gained 4.4 percent after both companies reported quarterly results. (AFP)