Wall Street Ticks Higher Friday        05/10 09:56

   U.S. stocks are heading toward the close of another winning week with some 
more modest gains on Friday.

   NEW YORK (AP) -- U.S. stocks are heading toward the close of another winning 
week with some more modest gains on Friday.

   The S&P 500 was 0.3% higher in morning trading and on track for a third 
straight winning week following a mostly miserable April. The Dow Jones 
Industrial Average was up 154 points, or 0.4%, as of 10:10 a.m. Eastern time, 
and the Nasdaq composite was 0.3% higher.

   The S&P 500 has returned within 0.4% of its record after coasting through a 
relatively quiet week following big gains at the end of last week. Revived 
hopes that the Federal Reserve may deliver cuts to interest rates this year 
drove the gains. So did a flood of stronger-than-expected reports on profits 
from big U.S. companies.

   Gen Digital jumped 14.7% after joining the parade and reporting better 
profit for the first three months of 2024 than analysts expected. The cyber 
safety company, whose brands include Norton and LifeLock, also authorized a 
program to buy back up to $3 billion of its stock. It joins a lengthening list 
of companies announcing big such programs, which helps goose per-share earnings 
for investors.

   Novavax more than doubled and shot 137.3% higher after announcing a deal 
with Sanofi that could be worth more than $1.2 billion. The agreement includes 
a license to co-commercialize Novavax's COVID-19 vaccine worldwide, with some 
exceptions. Novavax also reported a slightly smaller loss for the latest 
quarter than analysts expected.

   They helped offset a drop of 8.7% for Akamai Technologies, which topped 
expectations for profit but fell short for revenue. The cloud-computing, 
security and content delivery company also lowered some of its financial 
forecast for the full year.

   It said the strengthening of the U.S. dollar's value against other 
currencies is slicing into its business, along with slowing traffic growth 
across the industry. That helped overshadow its own announcement of a program 
to buy back up to $2 billion of its stock.

   In the bond market, Treasury yields rose following a discouraging report on 
U.S. consumer sentiment.

   The preliminary report from the University of Michigan suggested sentiment 
among U.S. consumers is much weaker than economists expected. The drop was 
large enough to be "statistically significant and brings sentiment to its 
lowest reading in about six months," according to Joanne Hsu, director of the 
survey of consumers.

   Potentially even more discouraging is that U.S. consumers were forecasting 
inflation of 3.5% in the upcoming year, up from their forecast of 3.2% a month 
earlier. If such expectations spiral higher, the fear is that it could lead to 
a vicious cycle that worsens inflation.

   It highlights how some companies have recently been describing increasing 
struggles among their customers, particularly their lower-income ones. Stock 
indexes lost some of their earlier gains following the report's release.

   The yield on the 10-year Treasury rose to 4.48% from 4.46% late Thursday. 
It's been generally easing since topping 4.70% late last month.

   Last week, Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell helped pull yields lower 
after saying the central bank remains closer to cutting its main interest rate 
than hiking it despite a string of stubbornly high readings on inflation this 
year. The Fed has been keeping its main interest rate at the highest level in 
more than two decades in hopes of getting high inflation fully under control.

   A cooler-than-expected jobs report at the end of last week, meanwhile, 
suggested the U.S. economy could pull off the tricky balancing act of staying 
solid enough to avoid a bad recession but not so strong that it worsens 
inflation.

   In stock markets abroad, London's FTSE 100 rose 0.6% after the government 
reported the U.K. economy bounced back to growth at the start of the year. The 
performance was better than expected, and it snapped two straight quarters 
where the economy shrank.

   In Japan, Tokyo's Nikkei 225 rose 0.4% after a report showed strong auto 
exports whittled down the nation's trade deficit and it racked up solid returns 
on overseas investments.