By the close, though, the S&P 500 finished up only fractionally, settling just below that 5,000-point milestone.

The Dow added one tenth of one percent and the Nasdaq gained a quarter of one percent.

Shares of chip designer ARM Holdings ended up nearly 50% after it forecast strong demand for designs related to artificial-intelligence features. That helped lift other chipmaker stocks, including Taiwan Semiconductor and Broadcom.

MarketVectors Indexes Head of Product Management and Marketing Joy Yang said the technology sector continues to lead the market higher.

"So we've seen some really strong earnings reports coming out and that's broadly led by tech stocks. But we've also seen it in companies like Disney, Uber that were up yesterday. But yesterday we saw ARM earnings up 50% over the day, so. You know, it's still very much an AI story."

More than half of the S&P 500 companies have reported quarterly earnings, with 80% of them surpassing expectations, compared with a long-term average of 67%, according to LSEG data.

Other stock movers included Hersey which gained four percent after announcing a cost-cutting plan despite giving a weak 2024 outlook.

And shares of Ralph Lauren jumped 17% following a third-quarter revenue beat.