Wall Street Today | Stocks Advance, S&P Crawling Toward Record High

U.S. stocks traded modestly higher Thursday, pushing the S&P 500 to within just a few points of a fresh record closing high.

U.S. stocks opened higher as the penultimate trading session of 2023 got underway, with all three major U.S. indexes at notable new highs. Amid low volume, investors everywhere were watching to see if the S&P 500 would eke out a new record closing high before the end of the year.

The index is trading about 13 points shy of its record close of 4,796.56.

"We're within 12 points of January 2022 closing high here, so we'll see if we make a run either today or tomorrow," said JJ Kinahan, CEO of IG North America, the parent company of brokerage Tastytrade, in an interview with MarketWatch. "Seems hard to believe that we wouldn't test it before the year is out."

Hopes for a soft landing for the U.S. economy and forecasts for a raft of interest-rate cuts by the Federal Reserve next year have helped to push stocks higher since late October, bringing the S&P 500's year-to-date advance to just shy of 25%.

Contract signings for US existing homes remained unchanged in November from the previous month even as mortgage rates scaled back from 23-year highs.

The index for pending home sales stayed at 71.6 in November, the National Association of Realtors released Thursday. The index reading was the lowest since the index’s founding in 2001. An index level of 100 equals the pace of contract activity in 2001.

The results were below the 0.9% increase that economists polled by Bloomberg had estimated.

Mortgage rates this week dropped to the lowest level since May, continuing a pullback from nearly 8% in October. A housing market turnaround is coming, experts say.

The average 30-year fixed mortgage rate was 6.61% this week, Freddie Mac said Thursday. It was the lowest level gauged by the weekly reading since May 25.

"Heading into the new year, the economy remains on firm ground with solid growth, a tight labor market, decelerating inflation, and a nascent rebound in the housing market," Sam Khater, Freddie Mac's chief economist, said in a statement.

Mortgage rates have fallen by more than a percentage point since peaking in October. Buyers may be waiting in the wings -- but housing market data has yet to capture signs of significantly more sales. A measure of contract signings for existing home purchases was flat in November with October's level.

U.S. crude-oil stocks fell more than expected last week, and gasoline inventories declined, while refineries increased their capacity use, according to data released Thursday by the Energy Information Administration.

Commercial crude-oil stocks, excluding the Strategic Petroleum Reserve, fell to 436.6 million barrels in the week ended Dec. 22 from 443.7 million barrels the previous week and were about 1% below the five-year average for the time of year, the EIA said. Analysts surveyed by The Wall Street Journal had predicted crude stockpiles would decrease by 2.4 million barrels.

The EIA said that storage in the SPR rose by 793,000 barrels to 353.3 million barrels. Crude futures, which were lower Thursday on easing concerns about shipping disruptions in the Red Sea, extended losses following the EIA report.