Stock Market News for Feb 23, 2026

U.S. stocks closed higher on Friday following a Supreme Court ruling that limited President Donald Trump’s authority over tariffs. The Nasdaq Composite, the S&P 500 and the Dow all ended in positive territory, with each of the three major indexes posting weekly gains.

How Did the Benchmarks Perform?

The Dow Jones Industrial Average (DJI) rose 0.5%, or 230.81 points, to close at 49,625.97. Twenty components of the 30-stock index ended in positive territory, and 10 ended in negative territory. The major gainer of the Dow was Amazon.com, Inc. AMZN. The stock price of this e-commerce company rose 2.6%. Amazon currently carries a Zacks Rank #3 (Hold). You can see the complete list of today’s Zacks #1 Rank stocks here.

The tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite advanced 0.9%, to finish at 22,886.07 points.

The S&P 500 gained 0.7%, to end at 6,909.51. Out of 11 broad sectors of the broad-market index, nine ended in positive territory while two ended in the negative zone. The Communication Services Select Sector SPDR (XLC), the Financials Select Sector SPDR (XLF) and the Consumer Discretionary Select Sector SPDR (XLY) rose 2.7%, 0.7%, and 1.3%, respectively, while the Energy Select Sector SPDR (XLE) fell 0.7%.

The fear gauge, the CBOE Volatility Index (VIX), decreased by 5.6% to 19.09. A total of 18.3 billion shares were traded on Friday, lower than the last 20-session average of 20.3 billion. The S&P 500 posted 34 new 52-week highs and seven new lows, and the Nasdaq Composite recorded 81 new highs and 153 new lows.

6-3 Ruling Curtails Trump’s Tariff Action

The U.S. Supreme Court ruled 6-3 that President Trump did not have the authority to impose tariffs under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA) and that IEEPA did not permit trade tariffs in the form of import duties. Chief Justice John Roberts’ decision determined that the Constitution grants Congress, not the President, the power to impose tariffs and taxation.

Economic Data

The Bureau of Economic Analysis reported that the U.S. GDP grew 1.4% in Q4 2025, missing the consensus estimate of 2.9%. This follows a revised GDP growth rate of 4.4% in Q3 2025.

The Department of Commerce also reported that the headline personal consumption expenditure (PCE) inflation increased 0.4% in December, in line with the previous month. Year over year, PCE inflation rose 2.9%. The core PCE inflation (excluding volatile food and energy items) rose 0.4% for the month.Year over year, core PCE inflation rose 3.0%. The December personal income reached $86.2 billion (0.3%) compared with a 0.4% increase in November. Disposable personal income increased by $75.7 billion (0.3%) in December, in line with November. The personal savings rate fell to 3.6% in December from 3.7% in November.

Other data released on Friday showed that the U.S. Census Bureau and the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development reported a 1.7% decline in new home sales to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 745,000 units in December 2025, down from a revised 758,000 units in November.

Weekly Roundup

Over the week, the S&P 500 climbed 1.08%, the Nasdaq advanced 1.51% and the Dow Jones Industrial Average posted a modest gain of 0.25%.

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This article originally published on Zacks Investment Research (zacks.com).

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The views and opinions expressed herein are the views and opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect those of Nasdaq, Inc.