Stocks jump despite higher US inflation, “worst is over”

Markets mostly rose on Wednesday.

The S&P 500 rose 1.3 percent while the STOXX Europe 600 rose 1.1 percent.

Earlier in Asia, the Nikkei 225 fell 0.4 percent but the Hang Seng surged 2.3 percent.

Markets were able to shake off a report on Wednesday that showed that US consumer prices rose 0.5 percent in January, the biggest increase in five months.

“Anything with inflation seems like a hot button nowadays, but it is a bit of a red herring here: Higher inflation and higher rates are symptoms of economic health,” said Karyn Cavanaugh, senior market strategist at Voya Financial.

“Clearly with this kind of a movement for the fourth day in a row, it does appear that it’s reasonable to assume that the worst is over at this point,” said Randy Frederick, managing director of trading and derivatives at Schwab Center for Financial Research.