Nvidia's monster rally drives US stocks to fresh records

• Stocks closed at record highs Thursday as Nvidia's stellar earnings lifted the broader market.
• Nvidia gained more than 16% in the session amid investors' unbridled AI enthusiasm.

US stocks soared on Thursday, led by a more than 15% spike in shares of Nvidia.

The huge rally helped lift the broader market, with the Dow Jones Industrial Average topping 39,000 for the first time, and the S&P 500 notching a fresh record of 5,087.05.The Nasdaq made its biggest one-day advance in a year, gaining nearly 3%.

Nvidia crushed its earnings report after hours on Wednesday, and the company shared upbeat guidance for the year ahead, reporting total revenue climbed 265% year-over-year in the fourth quarter.

Wall Street's enthusiasm for the chip maker is hard to overstate. Goldman Sachs called Nvidia the "most important stock in the world" and Wedbush's Dan Ives reiterated his moniker for chief executive Jensen Huang as the "godfather of AI."

Overseas, Japan's stock market is also being lifted by the AI boom. The Nikkei index hit its first record in 34 years, as chip stocks help the country's equity investors shrug off broader economic malaise. Japan is a recession, with GDP data showing the economy shrank 0.4% last quarter.

Markets are operating against a backdrop of an uncertain policy outlook, and forecasters are awaiting the Federal Reserve's next move. Jerome Powell so far has proved capable of nearly landing the economy, but he and his fellow central bankers must now decide how to ease interest rates without allowing for a rebound in inflation or a recession.

"The longer the Fed stays in the danger zone of higher-for-longer, the risks of a crash or hard landing go up," James McCann, deputy chief economist with Abrdn, told Business Insider in a Thursday interview. "They are so close to pulling off this soft landing, and there's an understanding that they can't leave policy too tight for too long."

Here's where US indexes stood as the market closed at 4:00 p.m. on Thursday:

• S&P 500: 5,087.03, up 2.11%

• Dow Jones Industrial Average: 39,069.11, up 1.18% (+456.87 points)

• Nasdaq Composite: 16,041.62, up 2.96%

Here's what else is going on:

• Jefferies said India's stock market will soar to $10 trillion by 2030.
• Nvidia just added an entire Netflix to its market value.
• A strategist said a recession is coming and stocks could plunge 26%.
• ECB said bitcoin's fair value is zero.
• JPMorgan said the US is heading toward stagflation, which would be bad news for stocks.

In commodities, bonds, and crypto:

• Oil prices climbed, with West Texas Intermediate up 0.82% to $78.55 a barrel. Brent crude, the international benchmark, moved up 0.71% to $83.62 a barrel.
• Gold edged lower 0.07% to $2,033.90 per ounce.
• The 10-year Treasury yield was about flat at 4.325%.
• Bitcoin climbed 1.25% to $51,638.