While you were sleeping: Wall St hits record highs

Wall Street advanced to new highs, pushed up by rising oil prices and optimism about US corporate earnings.

Energy, healthcare, financial and technology stocks led the surge.

Morgan Stanley rose 3.3% after its latest quarterly results beat expectations. For a second straight quarter, Morgan Stanley posted more fixed-income revenue than Goldman Sachs, reporting the smallest drop among top US investment banks on Wednesday, according to Bloomberg.

"We think we've made the right decisions and the results over the last five quarters in a row show we're credible and critically sized" in bond trading, Morgan Stanley Chief Financial Officer Jonathan Pruzan told Reuters.

Vertex Pharmaceuticals soared, up 21% after it announced better-than-expected results of a cystic fibrosis treatment.

Bucking the trend were shares of IBM, which dropped 4.6% after it reported disappointing revenue that fuelled concern about the company's outlook.

Also sliding were shares of United Continental, down 6% as the airline offered an outlook for passenger unit revenue that failed to meet expectations.

Dow rises 66 points
At the close trading in New York, the Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 66 points, or 0.3%, to 21,640.75. The Nasdaq Composite Index climbed 0.6% to 6385.04 and the Standard & Poor's 500 Index was up 0.5% to 2473.83, both record closing highs..

In the Dow, Cisco, Boeing and UnitedHealth, all up between 1.3% and 1.4%, outweighed slides by IBM and Wal-Mart (down 0.5%).

The US dollar, which fell to its lowest close since October on Tuesday, was little changed against a basket of 16 currencies. The yield on the 10-year U.S. Treasury note rose to 2.266% from 2.263% on Tuesday.

US crude oil climbed 1.5% to $US47.08 a barrel – the highest in six weeks – after a government report showed sharp drawdowns in oil and fuel stockpiles,

Euro stocks rise
In Europe, the Stoxx 600 Index finished the day with a gain of 0.8% from the previous close. Germany's DAX Index increased 0.2%, the UK's FTSE 100 Index added 0.6% and France's CAC40 Index gained 0.8%.

European Central Bank policy makers gather on Thursday, and investors will scrutinise President Mario Draghi's post-meeting comments for any clues about the timing for a change towards its stimulus programme.

"Markets are now betting it is only a matter of when the ECB starts preparing the ground for a slow retreat from its stimulus program," Michael Hewson, a market analyst at CMC Markets in London, wrote in a note, Bloomberg reported.

"Draghi will certainly have his work cut out in keeping a lid on the euro at this rate."

Shares of Reckitt Benckiser Group closed 1.6% higher in London as McCormick agreed to acquire the company's food business for $US4.2 billion.

(BusinessDesk)