The US markets ended mostly in green on Thursday, with the NASDAQ and the S&P 500 opening higher and hitting fresh record closing highs. Investors remained optimistic about possibility of U.S. signing more trade deals with its remaining trading partners before President Donald Trump's August 1 deadline. As UK, China, Vietnam, and Indonesia have already reached agreements with the U.S., Canada, India, South Korea, and the EU are ramping up their efforts. Additionally, U.S. Secretary of the Treasury Scott Bessent reportedly said that the talks were going better than they had been, and that progress was being made. Moreover, the Labor Department’s report indicated U.S. initial jobless claims unexpectedly fell last week. The report said initial jobless claims edged down to 2,17,000, a decrease of 4,000 from the previous week's unrevised level of 2,21,000. Street had expected jobless claims to rise to 2,27,000. With the unexpected dip, jobless claims fell to their lowest level since hitting 216,000 in the week ended April 12. 

Meanwhile, Dow Jones came moved to down weighed by losses from heavyweight IBM, which may be facing an investigation into billing practices. Moreover, the Commerce Department said that new home sales in the U.S. rebounded less than expected in June. The Commerce Department said new home sales rose by 0.6 percent to an annual rate of 627,000 in June after plummeting by 11.6 percent to a rate of 623,000 in May. Meanwhile, street had expected new home sales to jump by 4.3 percent to a rate of 650,000.

Nasdaq gained 37.94 points or 0.18 percent to 21,057.96 and S&P 500 rose 4.44 points or 0.07 percent to 6,363.35, while Dow Jones Industrial stumbled 316.38 points or 0.70 percent to 44,693.91.