US STOCKS-Wall Street regains footing after Powell calms inflation jitters

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* 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 on sticking with 2021 slowdown forecast
* Indexes rise: Dow 1.07%, S&P 0.89%, Nasdaq 0.68%

(Adds comments, updates to early afternoon)
By Devik Jain and Shreyashi Sanyal
Feb 24 (Reuters) - Wall Street's main indexes gained ground
on Wednesday as a selloff in technology-related stocks eased and
a rotation into cyclical shares continued after Federal Reserve
Chair Jerome Powell's comments soothed inflation worries.
Powell told lawmakers it may take more than three years to
reach the central bank's inflation goals, a further signal the
Fed plans to look beyond any post-pandemic spike in prices and
leave interest rates unchanged for a long time to come.
The Nasdaq index .IXIC regained footing by early afternoon
trading after falling as much as 1.3%, while the Dow Jones
Industrial Average .DJI hit a record high.
"There was a little bit of focus on inflation and interest
rates but that's going to be on the rear view mirror," said
David Yepez, lead equity analyst and portfolio manager at
Exencial Wealth Advisors.
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 1.9% to hit a
record high, 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 a shift in investments into more
economy-sensitive parts of the market.
Microsoft Corp MSFT.O , Amazon.com Inc AMZN.O , Facebook
FB.O and Apple Inc AAPL.O were down between 0.3% and 1%,
while 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," Yepez said.
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 4.8% 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. At 12:45 p.m. ET, the Dow Jones index was up 337.69 points,
or 1.07%, at 31,875.04, the S&P 500 .SPX was up 34.36 points,
or 0.89%, at 3,915.73 and the Nasdaq was up 92.14 points, or
0.68%, at 13,557.33.
All three main indexes were tracking 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 3.83% 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 2.21% after a media
report that Chinese ride-hailing giant Didi Chuxing Technology
Co Ltd plans to make its entry in Western Europe. issues outnumbered decliners by a 2.17-to-1 ratio
on the NYSE and a 3.12-to-1 ratio on the Nasdaq.
The S&P index recorded 84 new 52-week highs and no new low,
while the Nasdaq recorded 235 new highs and four new lows.