US STOCKS-Wall Street advances as Fed's Powell soothes inflation worries

* Growth stocks on track to end six-day losing streak
* Dow Jones hits record high, financials at all-time high
* Tesla up as Ark Invest buys $171 mln more shares
* Lowe's falls as it sticks with 2021 slowdown forecast
* Dow up 1.36%, S&P up 1.08%, Nasdaq up 0.65%

(Updates to late afternoon, adds dateline, changes byline, adds
comment)
By Gertrude Chavez-Dreyfuss
NEW YORK, Feb 24 (Reuters) - Shares on Wall Street rallied
on Wednesday, with the Dow hitting a record high, as a selloff
in technology-related stocks eased and a rotation into cyclical
shares continued after Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell's
comments calmed inflation worries.
The Nasdaq index, which traded as much as 1.3% lower earlier
in the session, regained its footing by early afternoon and
moved higher.
Powell told lawmakers on Wednesday it may take more than
three years to reach the central bank's inflation goals, a sign
the Fed plans to look beyond any post-pandemic spike in prices
and leave interest rates unchanged for a long time to come.
King Lip, chief investment strategist at Baker Avenue Asset
Management in San Francisco, said Powell's remark was a factor
in the market on Wednesday.
"The market is very concerned about inflation and the rise
in interest rates. But that's in contrast to what the Fed is
saying," he added.
Value-oriented stocks have enjoyed a bit of a bounce
recently, with the S&P 500 Value index .IVX rising for a
fourth straight day.
The S&P 500 financial sector .SPSY jumped 2.1% after
earlier hitting an all-time peak, while other cyclical stocks
including industrials .SPLRCI , energy .SPNY and materials
.SPLRCM also rose.
The S&P 500 Growth index .IGX , housing most of the
high-flying technology-related stocks, has come under pressure
in the last few days due to valuation concerns, elevated
Treasury yields and an investment shift into more
economy-sensitive parts of the market.
Microsoft Corp MSFT.O , Amazon.com Inc AMZN.O and Apple
Inc AAPL.O were down roughly between 0.3% and 1%, while
Facebook FB.O , Netflix Inc NFLX.O and Alphabet Inc GOOGL.O
reversed earlier declines.
"What's happening is just a little bit of a shift out of
growth and into value but today things are going slightly back
to normal and you have a little bit more moving into growth as
well," said David Yepez, lead equity analyst and portfolio
manager at Exencial Wealth Advisors.
Growth-oriented stocks are particularly sensitive to rising
yields as their value rests heavily on future earnings, which
are discounted more deeply when bond returns go up.
Tesla Inc TSLA.O gained 4.1% after star investor Cathie
Wood's Ark Invest fund bought a further $171 million worth of
the company's shares in the wake of a sharp fall in the
electric-car maker's stock.
In mid-afternoon trading, the Dow Jones Industrial Average
.DJI rose 427.47 points, or 1.36%, to 31,964.82, the S&P 500
.SPX gained 42.06 points, or 1.08%, to 3,923.43 and the Nasdaq
Composite .IXIC added 87.65 points, or 0.65%, to 13,552.85.
All three main indexes were on track to post strong monthly
gains, with the Dow and the S&P 500 set for their best month
since November.
Lowe's Cos Inc LOW.N slid 3.2% as it stuck by its 2021
outlook of a $4 billion to $8 billion drop in revenue, even
after reporting blow-out fourth quarter results. Uber Technologies Inc UBER.N dropped 3.1% after a media
report that Chinese ride-hailing giant Didi Chuxing Technology
Co Ltd plans to enter Western Europe.
Advancing issues outnumbered declining ones on the NYSE by a
2.16-to-1 ratio; on Nasdaq, a 2.78-to-1 ratio favored advancers.
The S&P 500 posted 98 new 52-week highs and no new lows; the
Nasdaq Composite recorded 252 new highs and four new lows.