* S&P 500, Nasdaq end lower
* U.S. dollar drops to two-week low
* Oil extends recent rally(New throughout, updates prices, market activity and commentsto U.S. close)
By Caroline Valetkevitch
NEW YORK, Feb 10 (Reuters) – MSCI’s gauge of stocks acrossthe globe rose on Wednesday for an eighth straight session evenas the S&P 500 eased, and U.S. Treasury yields tumbled on datashowing inflation remained tame in January.
U.S. Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell, in remarks to theEconomic Club of New York, called for a more comprehensiveapproach to end the jobs crisis while reassuring investorsinterest rates will remain low to spur the economy and jobsgrowth.
“Basically Powell is saying he’s not changing his tune, andthat simply means between the combination of an overly friendlyFed and stimulus, that’s just adding more enthusiasm to themarketplace,” said Peter Cardillo, chief market economist atSpartan Capital Securities in New York.
Bets on more fiscal aid have powered Wall Street’s mainindexes to a series of all-time peaks, with investors movinginto sectors such as energy, banks and industrials that arepoised to benefit from a recovering economy.
On Wednesday, the S&P consumer discretionary andtechnology sectors ended lower and were the biggestdrags on the S&P 500 in a volatile session. The S&P 500 hit arecord high at the opening.
Interest from retail investors appeared to broadly liftcannabis stocks, signaling the recent trading frenzy behindReddit favorites such as GameStop is shifting to othercompanies. Shares of Tilray jumped 50.9%.
Supporting the S&P 500, Twitter Inc shares rose13.2%, a day after the company beat Wall Street estimates forquarterly sales and profit and followed its social media peersto forecast a strong start to 2021 as ad spending rebounds froma rock bottom.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 61.97 points,or 0.2%, to 31,437.8, the S&P 500 lost 1.35 points, or0.03%, to 3,909.88 and the Nasdaq Composite dropped35.16 points, or 0.25%, to 13,972.53.
The pan-European STOXX 600 index lost 0.23% andMSCI’s gauge of stocks across the globe gained0.20%. The MSCI index also registerd a record high.
Bitcoin, meanwhile, consolidated recent gains onWednesday, trading 3.7% lower at $44,780. It hit a new high of$48,216 on Tuesday following Tesla’s disclosure of a$1.5 billion investment in the virtual currency.
The dollar fell to a two-week low, weighed down by U.S.inflation data, while benchmark U.S. Treasury yields alsotumbled.
The data showed that inflation stayed benign in January,disappointing investors betting that price pressures wouldincrease more. The Labor Department said its consumer priceindex increased 0.3% last month after climbing a revised 0.2% inDecember.
Benchmark 10-year notes last rose 10/32 in priceto yield 1.1242%, from 1.157% late on Tuesday.
The dollar index =USD drifted to a two-week low of 90.249,posting its third day of losses. It last traded 0.1% lower at90.377.
Oil rose, extending its rally for a ninth day, its longestwinning streak in two years, helped by producer supply cuts andhopes vaccine rollouts will drive a recovery in demand.
Brent crude rose 38 cents to settle at $61.47 abarrel, while U.S. crude climbed 32 cents to settle at$58.68.
Spot gold added 0.3% to $1,842.11 an ounce.
(Additional reporting by Jessica Resnick-Ault and KarenBrettell in New York and Elizabeth Howcroft in London and DevikJain and Medha Singh in Bengaluru;Editing by Larry King, Steve Orlofsky, Peter Graff, MargueritaChoy and David Gregorio)
