US stocks staged a solid rebound after the previous day’s savage sell-off, as forecast-beating earnings reports from the likes of Microsoft, Ford and Twitter provided a more encouraging backdrop.
The main equity indices on Wall Street recouped much of Wednesday’s losses, which had wiped out all the gains made by the S&P 500 in 2018 and left the Nasdaq Composite nursing its biggest one-day fall for seven years.
Yet the underlying mood remained cautious as recent uncertainty about corporate earnings growth — given the Trump administration’s protectionist policies, the strong dollar and the prospect of further rate rises from the Federal Reserve — kept market participants unsettled.