US STOCKS-S&P 500, Dow end up for 3rd day as Alphabet jumps, volatility eases

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* Alphabet rallies after results
* Volatility index eases
* Indexes: Dow up 0.1%, S&P 500 up 0.1%, Nasdaq down 0.02%

(Updates close with volume, share price details)
By Caroline Valetkevitch
Feb 3 (Reuters) - The Dow and S&P 500 rose slightly on
Wednesday, registering a third straight session of gains, with
Alphabet Inc's shares hitting a record high following its strong
quarterly results.
Alphabet GOOGL.O shares ended up 7.3% and provided the
biggest boost to the S&P 500. The Google parent late Tuesday
posted results that topped quarterly sales expectations for its
advertising and Cloud businesses, helped in part by the
pandemic. With recent stronger-than-expected results from Alphabet and
other companies, S&P 500 companies are now on track to post
earnings growth for the fourth quarter of 2020 and to defy
expectations for another quarterly profit drop due to the
pandemic, based on data from Refinitiv Wednesday. The Cboe Volatility index .VIX was down, and wild swings
in stock prices of GameStop GME.N and other social media
favorites subsided following a recent trading frenzy.
GameStop shares ended the day up just 2.7%.
"The broad tape continues to be strong," said Michael
O'Rourke, chief market strategist at JonesTrading in Stamford,
Connecticut.
The recent retail trading activity is likely "to be here for
a while," said O'Rourke. "I don't know if it's going to be here
with the same intensity ... It's hard to maintain that type of
intensity. What we'll probably see are coordinated movements in
individual names by that crowd."
Weighing on the Nasdaq and limiting gains in the broader
market, Amazon.com Inc AMZN.O shares eased 2% as Jeff Bezos'
surprise move to step down as chief executive quashed optimism
about bumper quarterly results. However, analysts were upbeat on
the promotion of its cloud computing head to the top job.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average .DJI rose 36.12 points,
or 0.12%, to 30,723.6, the S&P 500 .SPX gained 3.86 points, or
0.10%, to 3,830.17 and the Nasdaq Composite .IXIC dropped 2.23
points, or 0.02%, to 13,610.54.
U.S. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen is calling a meeting
this week of top officials, including from the U.S. Securities
and Exchange Commission and the Federal Reserve, to discuss
market volatility driven by retail trading in shares of
GameStop, silver and other stocks favored on social media.
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The SEC is reviewing social media posts for signs of
potential fraud behind the recent trade frenzy in shares of
GameStop and other companies, according to a Bloomberg News
report, citing people familiar with the matter. U.S. President Joe Biden held a conference call with House
of Representatives Democrats and talked with Democratic senators
at the White House as the party prepared to use a procedural
maneuver to push Biden's $1.9 trillion coronavirus relief
package through without Republican votes if necessary.
On the economic front, the ADP Report showed hiring by U.S.
private employers rebounded by 174,000 in January after a drop
in December. A more comprehensive jobs report is expected on
Friday. A separate ISM survey showed U.S. services industry activity
raced to its highest level in nearly two years in January.
Volume on U.S. exchanges was 13.97 billion shares, compared
with the 15.6 billion average for the full session over the last
20 trading days.
Advancing issues outnumbered declining ones on the NYSE by a
1.47-to-1 ratio; on Nasdaq, a 1.62-to-1 ratio favored advancers.
The S&P 500 posted 8 new 52-week highs and no new lows; the
Nasdaq Composite recorded 172 new highs and 1 new lows.