* 10 of 11 S&P 500 sectors gain, industrials lead
* Best Buy falls on weak same-store sales forecast
* Dollar General climbs after raising profit forecast
* Dow up 1.25%, S&P 500 up 1.27%, Nasdaq up 1.48%
(Updates to close, changes byline)
By Chuck Mikolajczak
NEW YORK, Aug 29 (Reuters) - U.S. stocks rallied more than
1% on Thursday, buoyed by gains in the trade-sensitive
technology and industrial sectors as China expressed hope on
trade negotiations with the United States, easing concerns that
rising tensions could stoke a recession.
China's commerce ministry said both sides are discussing the
next round of talks scheduled for September, but progress would
be determined by whether Washington could create favorable
conditions.
U.S. President Donald Trump said in a Fox News radio
interview that trade talks were scheduled for Thursday "at a
different level," but did not provide details. Some analysts cautioned that the comments from China were
light on substance, and pointed to month-end rebalancing on
Friday as supportive of stock gains.
"It sounds to me like more of a continued slow-walking,"
said Thomas Martin, senior portfolio manager at Globalt
Investments in Atlanta. "But clearly it is time to not ratchet
things up further."
Heavyweight tech stocks with tariff exposure, such as Apple
Inc AAPL.O , up 1.69%, and Microsoft MSFT.O , up 1.89%,
boosted the technology sector by 1.73% for its best day since
Aug. 16.
Chipmakers, which draw a large part of their revenue from
China, also gained, sending the Philadelphia semiconductor index
.SOX up 2.25%.
Industrial names that have also been highly correlated to
trade progress, such as United Technologies (NYSE:UTX) UTX.N , advanced,
with the sector up 1.77%.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average .DJI rose 326.15 points,
or 1.25%, to 26,362.25, the S&P 500 .SPX gained 36.63 points,
or 1.27%, to 2,924.57 and the Nasdaq Composite .IXIC added
116.51 points, or 1.48%, to 7,973.39.
Still, the three main indexes were on course to log their
worst monthly performance and first monthly decline since a
selloff in May, on worries the intensified trade battle between
the world's two largest economies will lead to a global
recession.
The Trump administration on Wednesday made official its
additional 5% tariff on $300 billion in Chinese imports and set
collection dates of Sept. 1 and Dec. 15, prompting several
hundreds of U.S. companies to warn of price hikes. A number of companies, including electronics retailer Best
Buy Co Inc BBY.N and teen apparel retailer Abercrombie & Fitch
Co ANF.N , reported results earlier on Thursday and warned of
the impact from tariffs.
Shares of Best Buy slid 7.99%, making it one of the worst
performing issues on the S&P 500, while those of Abercrombie
tumbled 15.10%. Dollar General Corp (NYSE:DG) DG.N was the best performer among S&P
500 .SPX companies, rising 10.68% on an upbeat full-year
profit forecast. The S&P retail index .SPXRT climbed 1.67%.
Advancing issues outnumbered declining ones on the NYSE by a
3.23-to-1 ratio; on Nasdaq, a 2.69-to-1 ratio favored advancers.
The S&P 500 posted 27 new 52-week highs and no new lows; the
Nasdaq Composite recorded 40 new highs and 59 new lows.
About 6.01 billion shares changed hands on U.S. exchanges,
compared with the 7.23 billion daily average over the last 20
sessions.