US STOCKS-Wall St reverses course to end higher after WHO comments

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* Facebook slides on warning of slowing revenue growth

* Tesla jumps after second straight quarterly profit

* Dow up 0.43%, S&P 500 up 0.31%, Nasdaq up 0.26%

(New throughout, updates prices, market activity and comments

to market close)

By Chuck Mikolajczak

NEW YORK, Jan 30 (Reuters) - U.S. stocks rebounded late to

close higher on Thursday after the World Health Organization

(WHO) declared the China coronavirus a global emergency, while

earnings painted a mixed picture.

After the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention

reported the first U.S. incident of person-to-person spread of

the virus, the WHO said recent weeks have seen an unprecedented

outbreak, met by an unprecedented response. It said it was not

recommending limiting trade or travel to China.

"The market is starting to look at this and say at some

point in time this will crest and the news will start getting

better," said Art Hogan, chief market strategist at National

Securities in New York.

"Precautions are being taken and that means at some point

there will be light at the end of the tunnel, that is when the

market reacts constructively."

Facebook FB.O shares slumped 6.14% after the social media

company warned of slowing growth as its business matured and it

reported a surge in quarterly expenses. The decline weighed on the S&P communication services index

.SPLRCL , which lost 0.79%. Defensive sectors such as utilities

and consumer staples, considered safer in times of economic

uncertainties, advanced.

The main U.S. stock indexes are on course for their second

straight week of declines as the virus has disrupted global

travel and forced several companies to suspend operations in

China.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average .DJI rose 124.99 points,

or 0.43%, to 28,859.44, the S&P 500 .SPX gained 10.26 points,

or 0.31%, to 3,283.66 and the Nasdaq Composite .IXIC added

23.77 points, or 0.26%, to 9,298.93.

Earnings expectations have been slowly improving for S&P 500

companies, with Refinitiv data showing a 0.7% rise in

fourth-quarter profit, compared with a 0.6% decline estimated at

the start of the season.

Microsoft Corp MSFT.O gained 2.82% after it beat

expectations for quarterly earnings, driven by Azure cloud

computing revenue growth. Tesla Inc TSLA.O jumped 10.30% after the maker of electric

cars posted a second straight quarterly profit as vehicle

deliveries hit a record. Altria Inc MO.N slid 4.21% after the tobacco company said

it took another $4 billion charge on its investment in Juul Labs

Inc. Package delivery firm United Parcel Service Inc UPS.N

dropped 6.70% after it forecast full-year earnings below

estimates.

After the close, Amazon AMZN.O gained 10% after

fourth-quarter revenue topped expectations. Declining issues outnumbered advancing ones on the NYSE by a

1.01-to-1 ratio; on Nasdaq, a 1.32-to-1 ratio favored decliners.

The S&P 500 posted 48 new 52-week highs and 14 new lows; the

Nasdaq Composite recorded 57 new highs and 94 new lows.

About 7.72 billion shares changed hands in U.S. exchanges,

compared with the 7.54 billion daily average over the last 20

sessions.