Sharjah24 – AFP: Wall Street stocks finished solidly higher Wednesday after the Federal Reserve lifted interest rates in a heavily-telegraphed move designed to counter inflation.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average finished up 1.6 percent at 34,063.10.

The broad-based S&P 500 gained 2.2 percent to 4,357.86, while the tech-rich Nasdaq Composite Index surged 3.8 percent to 13,436.55.

The Fed's first interest rate hike since 2018 marks an effort to counter spiking consumer prices even as Russia's invasion of Ukraine introduces new uncertainty in an economy battered by supply chain snarls and labor shortages.

Fed Chair Jerome Powell expressed confidence the US economy could withstand the tightening of monetary policy, even as the central bank trimmed its growth forecast for 2022.

Analysts have also cited hopes for a peaceful resolution to the conflict as aiding sentiment.

Earlier, US data showed retail sales rose 0.3 percent last month in a move largely attributed to higher gasoline prices.

The prospect of higher interest rates lifted shares of large banks such as JPMorgan Chase and Bank of America, both of which won more than three percent.

Among individual companies, Starbucks jumped 5.2 percent after longtime chief Howard Schultz announced he would return to lead the company on an interim basis and Kevin Johnson would step down, as the coffee giant faces a unionization drive at US stores.