US stocks were mixed at Thursday's market close on Thursday, with Tesla's (TSLA) 20% jump post-earnings sending the tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite (^IXIC) and S&P 500 (^GSPC) higher as the Dow Jones Industrial Average (^DJI) closed lower.

Yahoo Finances Senior Markets Reporter Josh Schafer breaks down his trading day takeaways from Thursday's session, including Tesla's (TSLA) stock surge and signs of budding strength in the US economy in the form of the newest initial jobless claims data and business activity.

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This post was written by Naomi Buchanan.