Stocks extended their gains for a second session on Wednesday, rebounding from last week's volatility, as investors continued to be encouraged by early Omicron data signalling that the variant may be less severe than previous strains. The tech-heavy Nasdaq outperformed, jumping over 3% as tech names climbed higher, while the Dow Jones Industrial Average rose nearly 500 points and the S&P 500 increased by over 2%.

Here's how the market settled on Tuesday:

S&P 500 Index (SPY  ): +2.07% or +95.08 points to 4,686.75

Dow Jones Industrial Average (DIA  ): +1.40% or +492.40 points to 35,719.43

Nasdaq Composite Index (QQQ  ): +3.03% or +461.76 points to 15,686.92

Amazon's AWS experiences outage:

Amazon's (AMZN  ) cloud unit, Amazon Web Services, was hit was an outage on Tuesday that took down many websites and services, including Netflix (NFLX  ), Disney+ (DIS  ), Slack (CRM  ), Robinhood (HOOD  ) and Coinbase (COIN  ).

AWS posted a notice on its status page that said it was experiencing problems with certain APIs and the AWS Management Console, which impacted the cloud computing unit's main U.S. East-1 region hoted in northern Virginia.

"We have identified the root cause and we are actively working towards recovery," AWS said in the notice.

Morgan Stanley raises Apple's price target from $164 to $200:

Morgan Stanley's Apple (AAPL  ) analyst Katy Huberty raised the tech giant's price target from $164 to $200 and maintains its equivalent of a buy rating on Tuesday, citing that new products from Apple have yet to reflect its share price.

"Today, we know that Apple is working on products to address two significantly large markets--AR/VR and Autonomous Vehicles--and as we get closer to these products becoming a reality, we believe valuation would need to reflect the optionality of these future opportunities," Huberty wrote in a note to investors.

Huberty argues that Apple's stock price has increased nearly 500% over the last five years, driven by the launch of new products and services, and not from iPhone sales. Huberty noted that Apple's services business has grown to nearly $70 billion annually and its wearables and accessories segment contributes $38 billion annually.

Morgan Stanley also increase the firm's December quarter iPhone shipment forecast by 3 million units to 83 million units, a 4% increase year-over-year, with Huberty adding that Apple has not been impacted by the same supply constraints it experienced last quarter.

American Airlines CEO to step down, President to take over:

American Airlines (AAL  ) announced Tuesday that Chief Executive Doug Parker will be retiring from his role, effective March 31, with current President Robert Isom taking over at that time. Parker will continue to serve as the airline's board of directors chair.

"I have worked with Robert for two decades and I am incredibly pleased that he will be the next CEO for American Airlines, which is truly the best job in our industry," Parker said in a statement. "We are well-positioned to take full advantage of our industry's recovery, and now is the right time for a handoff we have planned and prepared for. I feel extremely fortunate to hand the reins to this clear and capable leader."

Here's how market benchmarks started trading soon after open:

S&P 500 Index: +1.31% or +60.04 points to 4,651.71

Dow Jones Industrial Average: +1.03% or +363.65 points to 35,590.68

Nasdaq Composite Index: +1.99% or +303.63 points to 15,525.65