Wall Street Steady After 3-Day Winning 05/07 10:17

   U.S. stocks are holding relatively steady Tuesday as trading on Wall Street 
calms following some sharp recent swings.

   NEW YORK (AP) -- U.S. stocks are holding relatively steady Tuesday as 
trading on Wall Street calms following some sharp recent swings.

   The S&P 500 was 0.2% higher in morning trading, coming off a strong 
three-day winning streak. The Dow Jones Industrial Average was up 93 points, or 
0.2%, as of 10:50 a.m. Eastern time, and the Nasdaq composite was 0.1% higher.

   Kenvue, the company whose brands include Band-Aids and Tylenol, rose 5.9% 
after topping analysts' forecasts for both profit and revenue in the latest 
quarter.

   The Walt Disney Co. sank 9.6% despite reporting stronger results for its 
latest quarter than analysts expected. Its revenue fell a bit shy of forecasts, 
and it expects its entertainment streaming business to soften in the current 
quarter.

   They're among the tail end of companies reporting their results for the 
first three months of the year. The majority of companies has so far been 
beating forecasts for earnings, but they're not getting as big a boost to their 
stock prices afterward as they usually do, according to FactSet. Not only that, 
companies that fall short of profit expectations have seen their stock prices 
sink by more the following day than they have historically.

   That could suggest investors are listening to critics who have been calling 
the U.S. stock market broadly too expensive following its run to records this 
year. For stock prices to climb further, either profits will need to grow more 
dynamically or interest rates will need to fall.

   The latter still looks like a possibility on Wall Street following some 
events last week that traders found encouraging.

   Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell strongly suggested the central bank is 
still closer to cutting its main interest rate than hiking it, despite a string 
of stubbornly high readings on inflation this year. A cooler-than-expected jobs 
report on Friday, meanwhile, suggested the U.S. economy could pull off the 
balancing act of staying solid enough to avoid a bad recession without being so 
strong that it keeps inflation too high.

   After charging higher through the start of this year as hopes dimmed for 
cuts to interest rates by the Federal Reserve, Treasury yields have been 
regressing this month to offer some relief for the stock market.

   The yield on the 10-year Treasury fell to 4.43% from 4.49% late Monday. The 
two-year yield, which moves more closely with expectations for the Fed, slipped 
to 4.81% from 4.83%.

   While yields have been declining over the last week, strategists at Wells 
Fargo Investment Institute still expect long-term yields to remain high for a 
while. That's in part because expectations are broadly for inflation to remain 
higher than hopes for some time. Luis Alvarado, global fixed income strategist, 
believes the 10-year yield will likely remain near its recent range.

   Elsewhere on Wall Street, Crocs jumped 9% after reporting better profit and 
revenue than expected. It benefited from strong growth internationally.

   International Flavors & Fragrances, which makes ingredients used in food and 
perfume, gained 3.9% after reporting better profit and revenue than expected. 
It also said it expects its revenue for the full year to come in at the higher 
end of its forecasted range.

   Lucid Group tumbled 11.1% after the electric-vehicle maker reported a worse 
loss for the latest quarter than analysts expected.

   Builders FirstSource fell 15.4% despite topping forecasts for profit and 
revenue. The supplier of building products said a weakening multi-family market 
and higher mortgage rates were creating challenges, and its forecast for how 
much cash it will generate this year came in below some analysts' expectations.

   In stock markets abroad, indexes jumped 2.2% in Seoul and 1.6% in Tokyo but 
were mixed in the rest of Asia. Australia's S&P/ASX 200 advanced 1.4% after the 
central bank decided to keep interest rates unchanged.

   European stock indexes also rose.