LONDON: U.S. stocks ended stronger on Wednesday as Visa’s potential expansion into China and talk of a turnaround at McDonald’s helped investors look beyond a mixed bag of quarterly earnings.
All of the 10 major S&P 500 sectors rose, with the tech index gaining 1.09 percent, propelled by Visa and MasterCard.
Visa ended 4.07 percent higher at $68.01 after hitting a record high of $69.98, while MasterCard closed up 3.91 percent after China said it would open up its market to foreign firms for clearing domestic bank card transactions.
McDonald’s surged 3.13 percent after it said it was working on a plan to reverse its shrinking sales.
A week ago, more than 80 percent of the S&P 500 companies to have posted their March-quarter earnings had beaten estimates. But with 121 reports now in, that number has slipped to 71.9 percent – just above the 70 percent earnings beat rate seen over the past four quarters. Many have blamed misses on revenue on a strong dollar for making their products more expensive overseas.
