(Reuters) – Wall Street ticked up on Thursday afternoon with the Nasdaq Composite briefly trading above its all-time closing high, helped by gains in energy stocks as oil prices jumped. At 12:21 p.m. the Dow Jones industrial average .DJI was up 52.28 points, or 0.29 percent, at 18,090.55, the S&P 500 .SPX was higher 6.1 points, or 0.29 percent, at 2,114.06 and the Nasdaq Composite .IXIC was up 13.76 points, or 0.27 percent, at 5,048.93. The Nasdaq .IXIC had closed at a record-high of 5048.62 in March 2000 that signaled the top of the dot-com bubble. All 10 major S&P sectors were higher, helped by a 2 percent rise in the teleservices index .SPLRCL and a 1 percent advance in the energy sector .SPNY. Both Brent LCOc1 and U.S. crude CLc1 futures rose more than 3 percent on heightened concerns over the security of Middle East supplies as a civil war escalated in Yemen. “The energy markets flattened out over the last month and it actually appears that you will probably see stronger energy prices,” said Scott Colyer, CEO of Advisors Asset Management in Monument, Colorado. The higher oil prices helped investors shrug off a raft of disappointing results and forecasts. PepsiCo (PEP.N), Procter & Gamble (PG.N) and 3M (MMM.N) all blamed the strong dollar for missing estimates or cutting forecasts. P&G fell 2 percent to $ 81.41, 3M fell 2.2 percent to $ 161.05 and Pepsi was down 1.2 percent at $ 96.06. Facebook (FB.O) fell 1.1 percent to $ 83.64 on Thursday, a day after posting quarterly revenue that missed analysts estimates. General Motors (GM.N) shares dropped 3.4 percent to $ 35.88 after the automaker’s revenue also fell short. PulteGroup (PHM.N) shares slid 7.3 percent to $ 20.09 after the homebuilder reported a surprise fall in quarterly profit. Texas Instruments (TXN.O) slumped 7.3 percent to $ 54.43 a day after it forecast current-quarter revenue below analysts’ expectations, citing weak demand and a strong dollar. Shares of other chipmakers .SOX also fell. Earnings expected after the bell include Amazon (AMZN.O), Microsoft (MSFT.O) and Google (GOOGL.O). Advancing issues outnumbered declining ones on the NYSE by 1,999 to 926, for a 2.16-to-1 ratio on the upside; on the Nasdaq, 1,488 issues rose and 1,138 fell for a 1.31-to-1 ratio favoring advancers. The benchmark S&P 500 index was posting 25 new 52-week highs and no new lows; the Nasdaq Composite was recording 74 new highs and 29 new lows. (Additional reporting by Rodrigo Campos; Editing by Savio D’Souza)
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