(August 2) Stocks open higher to kick off August on positive note.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 179 points, or about 0.5%. S&P 500 gained 0.6% and Nasdaq Composite added 0.5%. The S&P 500 and the Dow sit less than 1% from new all-time highs.
Stocks continued to shake off concerns about the delta variant of Covid, and stocks that would benefit the most from a continued economic recovery led the gains in premarket trading Monday.
EV stocks rose in morning trading. NIO Inc. stock swings to a gain of 2.37% toward 4th-straight gain after July deliveries data.
Among individual stocks, Square gained about 7%. The payments company agreed to buy Australia’s Afterpay—which allows users to pay for goods in interest-free installments—in an all-stockdeal valued at around $29 billion.
Shares of Carnival Corp. were up 2.52% in early trading. Major banks including Morgan Stanley and Bank of America were higher. Airline shares were mostly higher.
“We believe the reopening and recovery trend is on track and continue to see upside for equities,” wrote Mark Haefele, chief investment officer of global wealth management at UBS. “We expect the S&P 500 to climb to around 4,650 by June next year, versus 4,395 at present. But we see the greatest upside for cyclical parts of the market, including energy, financials, and Japanese stocks.”
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