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Update: Dow Marks Best Day in More Than 4 Weeks as Rate Hike Bets Ease

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Update: Dow Marks Best Day in More Than 4 Weeks as Rate Hike Bets Ease

(Updates with market moves at the end of the day, and other changes, if any.)

The Dow Jones Industrial Average and the S&P 500 rose the most in more than four weeks on Thursday as traders tempered expectations for a September interest rate hike.

The Dow advanced 1.2% to close at 53,686.11, while the S&P 500 climbed 1.1% to 7,747.71 -- both marking their biggest single-day percentage gains since Aug. 4. The Nasdaq Composite rose 1.4% to 26,584.06. Most sectors ended in the green, led by consumer discretionary, while energy saw the biggest drop.

Fed Governor Christopher Waller said Thursday he would support keeping interest rates steady if further signs of disinflation emerge, though he seemed willing to tighten monetary policy if price pressures intensify.

Markets are now almost evenly split between a tighter policy later this month and another Fed pause, according to the CME FedWatch tool. The probability of a 25-basis-point rate hike was 63% on Wednesday.

"The relatively quick and notable reaction in the market to the latest Fed commentary suggests investors were already skeptical of the Fed's intentions to move forward with firmer policy as early as later this month," Stifel Chief Economist Lindsey Piegza said in a note e-mailed to.

Treasury yields were lower, with the two-year yield down 4.6 basis points at 4.34% and the 10-yield yield falling 2.2 basis points to 4.77%.

West Texas Intermediate crude oil was up 0.8% at $91.72 a barrel in Thursday late-afternoon trade, while Brent edged up 0.2% to $95.80.

The Kuwaiti military said Thursday it was confronting missile and drone attacks from Iran.

Earlier this week, the US Central Command said that its forces completed a wave of strikes against Iranian military targets.

In company news, shares of Broadcom (AVGO) fell 2.7% after releasing its latest financial results. The chipmaker's guidance that its artificial intelligence revenue will double in fiscal 2027 was slightly below Wall Street's consensus but the company is likely to "handily" top the projection, Truist Securities said in a note.

Snowflake (SNOW) jumped nearly 17% as the cloud-based data platform lifted its full-year product revenue outlook.

Ciena (CIEN) was the worst performer on the S&P 500, down 10%, despite raising its full-year revenue outlook as the networking systems and software company reported better-than-expected fiscal third-quarter results.

Campbell's (CPB) guided for a soft fiscal 2027 outlook amid persistent inflation worries and cut quarterly dividend. The stock slumped 7%.

In economic news, US job cut announcements in August hit the lowest total for the month in four years, Challenger, Gray & Christmas said, ahead of the official jobs report due Friday.

The US economy likely added 55,000 nonfarm jobs in August, compared with a loss of 23,000 reported for the month prior, according to a Bloomberg poll. The unemployment rate seen holding at 4.1%.

Spot gold rose 2.1% to $4,471.47 per troy ounce, while silver advanced 3.2% to $67.58 per ounce.

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