Stocks were little changed on Friday as Wall Street looked to end a winning year on a high note and possibly a new milestone.
The S&P 500 enters the final trading day of 2023 less than 0.5% from a new record high, which could serve as an exclamation point on a rally that has gained strength in the final months of the year.
The S&P 500 is up 24.6% in 2023, with Dow rising 13.8%. The Nasdaq Composite has led the way with a gain of 44.2% on the year — on pace for its biggest annual increase since 2003.
All the major averages are also on track to notch their ninth consecutive winning weeks, with the S&P up 0.6%. That would mark its longest stretch of weekly gains since 2004. The Dow and Nasdaq are up 0.9% and 0.7%, respectively, and on pace to clinch their longest weekly winning streaks since 2019.
The story for much of 2023 was the excitement around artificial intelligence fueling big gains for the “Magnificent 7” stocks like Nvidia and Microsoft, which bolstered the indexes even as the average stock struggled amid rising interest rates and fueled the outperformance of the tech-heavy Nasdaq.
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