US Stocks Today: Wall Street is at near record highs as investors await Tesla’s earnings; Gold slips again – The Times of India

US stocks are trading largely flat on Wednesday as investors await earnings results from electric carmaker Tesla, while gold prices continue their slide from record highs.The S&P 500 fell 0.1% in early trading, falling just short of its all-time high earlier this month, according to news agency AP. The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 65 points, or 0.1%, while the Nasdaq composite lost 0.3% as of 9:35 a.m. Eastern time. The Dow Jones fell less than 0.2% to 46,845.30, the S&P 500 was virtually unchanged at 6,731.94 and the Nasdaq Composite fell 0.2% to 22,916.49.Investors continued to focus on corporate earnings. Bank stocks such as Capital One Financial and Western Alliance Bancorp held steady after reporting stronger-than-expected summer profits. Intuitive Surgical rose 16.5% and GE Vernova rose 0.5% after robust quarterly results. However, Netflix saw its shares plunge 8.2% after missing earnings estimates, while AT&T fell 4.5% and Texas Instruments fell 7.7%.Among notable gainers, Beyond Meat continued the meme stock’s surge, surging 48.9% on Wednesday, extending its weekly gain to nearly 735%, according to AP. The rally followed Walmart’s announcement to expand Beyond Meat products to more than 2,000 U.S. stores.Victoria Fernandez of Crossmark Global Investments was quoted by news agency AFP as saying: “Profits are really critical,” adding that strong profit margins and earnings data had “driven the market.”Meanwhile, gold prices fell 0.8% to $4,075 an ounce after Tuesday’s 5.3% decline surpassed record highs. Despite the decline, prices continue to rise by more than 50% this year. According to AP, the withdrawal followed growing criticism that gold had “gone too far, too fast.”In global markets, London’s FTSE 100 rose 1% on hopes of a UK rate cut, while South Korea’s Kospi rose 1.6%. Hong Kong’s Hang Seng fell 0.9% and Paris’ CAC 40 fell 0.2%.The yield on 10-year U.S. Treasury bonds fell slightly to 3.96%, down from 3.98% the day before, according to AP.