S&P 500 and Dow close at record highs with tech and retail in spotlight

The S&P 500 and Dow Jones Industrial Average set fresh closing highs in a truncated Black Friday session, boosted by technology companies such as Nvidia (NVDA.O), opens new tab, although retail was the focus as the Christmas shopping season began.

Information technology stocks (.SPLRCT), which opens in a new tab, helped raise the benchmark S&P 500 and blue-chip Dow, which were also aided by industrial companies.

Nvidia surged 2%, while Tesla (TSLA.O) climbed 3.7%.

Investors tracked how buyers responded to steep Black Friday bargains. Adobe Analytics predicted that customers would spend a record $10.8 billion on online sales, up 9.9% over Black Friday last year.

Target (TGT.N) shares increased 1.7%, while Macy's (M.N) shares climbed 1.8%.

The S&P 500 advanced 0.56% to 6,032.44 points, breaking its intraday record high of 6,025.42 set on November 26.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average gained 0.42%, reaching 44,910.65 points. The Nasdaq rose 0.83% to 19,218.17 points.

Retailers import a lot. Inventory levels are critical to their profitability and capacity to regulate margins, so they will be among the industries targeted by tariffs," said Ross Mayfield, an investment strategist at Baird.

"But so far, things are looking very great for the Black Friday and Cyber Monday sale."

Chip stocks recovered from Wednesday's losses, pushing the Philadelphia SE Semiconductor index (.SOX), opens new tab, 1.5 percent higher.