us stocks turned higher thursday afternoon with the sp 500 index and nasdaq joining the dow in positive territory despite the 10year treasury yields rise above 4 and concerns about additional federal reserve rate hikes the dow jones industrial average was finding support as investors cheered results from component salesforce inc crm on wednesday the dow eked out a tiny gain while the sp 500 fell 05 and the nasdaq dropped 07 stocks were attempting to bounce on thursday afternoon despite rising bond yields that initially weighed on equities the sp 500 and nasdaq both turned positive in afternoon trade joining the dow jones industrial average in looking to book modest gains some of the dow components performed well in terms of earnings said don townswick director of equity strategies at conning in a phone interview its a classic case where we have earnings come in better than expected on their face and that tends to spur some positive market moves bond yields extended their rise after a round of us labor data thursday firsttime claims for unemployment benefits fell to 190000 last week from 192000 the previous week fourthquarter labor productivity was revised lower and unit labor costs were revised higher recent data also indicated that the federal reserves campaign of interestrate hikes has yet to significantly slow the us economy and suppress inflation which has pushed benchmark borrowing costs back above 4 as traders bet the central bank will have to tighten monetary policy further data releases like this are why policy makers continue to reiterate their intention to raise rates higher before pausing and then to leave rates in a restrictive territory for quite a while said thomas simons money market economist at jefferies in a note atlanta fed president raphael bostic on thursday said he was firmly in support of a 25 basis point rate increase at the central banks latemarch policy meeting while telling reporters a case also can be made for revising up the feds current 5525 terminal rate projection they recognize that inflation has come off the highs in recent months but they are concerned that it will settle at a level above their 2 target simons said the bounce in the january data is exactly the sort of thing they are worried about he wrote referring to a run of hotterthanexpected labor and inflation data the fed is expected to increase its policy interest rate to a range of 475 to 5 at its march 22 meeting since the central bank began raising borrowing costs from effectively zero about a year ago the sp 500 index has dipped more than 9 townswick at conning said he still has some doubts about the quality of earnings and that we dont really see any growth being forecast right now in earnings but he also thinks the stock market could pull off an average return in 2023 roughly in the 68 range with much of the toll of higher interest rates likely priced in the good news is that the markets have weathered a pretty good tightening cycle he said data from the eurozone published thursday showed annual consumerprice inflation of 85 in february down only fractionally from januarys 86 and higher than the 82 forecast by economists investors also were monitoring a 66 drop in shares of tesla inc tsla after the electricvehicle makers investor day didnt impress investors on the other hand a 124 jump in shares ofsalesforce following its results after wednesdays closing bell led dow gainers readwith the 10year treasury topping 4 its time to start dipping your toes in says wamco