NEW YORK, June 20 — Wall Street stocks sprinted higher early today, celebrating the new dovish tilt of the US Federal Reserve and lifting the S&P 500 back into record territory.

Stocks rose modestly yesterday following the Fed announcement, which signalled the US central bank could soon cut interest rates, but investors showed greater enthusiasm today even though analysts said the monetary policy statement largely met expectations.

The broad-based S&P 500 rose a few points above its all-time closing price in April to 2,953.91 about 15 minutes into trading, a gain of 0.9 per cent compared to yesterday’s close.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average also climbed 0.9 per cent to 26,741.05, while the tech-rich Nasdaq Composite Index jumped 1.1 per cent to 8,076.93.

Markets are looking ahead to the New York Stock Exchange premiere of Slack Technologies, a cloud-oriented software company.

Among individual companies, software giant Oracle surged 7.5 per cent as it reported better-than-expected results and offered an upbeat outlook.

Carnival cruise lines slumped 9.8 per cent after reporting a 19.6 per cent drop in quarterly profits to US$451 million and cutting its full-year profit forecast.

The company said the US government’s policy change on Cuba preventing American cruise lines from travelling to the island would reduce earnings per share by between four and six cents. — AFP