NEW YORK: Wall Street stocks mostly rose early Monday, extending the positive post-election trend into December amid signs of strong holiday retail sales.
Equities enjoyed a robust November with markets cheering a swift resolution of the US presidential election and greeting President-elect Donald Trump’s growth agenda while shrugging off worries about tariffs.
“I don’t know anybody who’s bearish and December is, historically, with November one of the two super positive months for equity performance,” said LBBW’s Karl Haeling.
About 20 minutes into trading, the Dow Jones Industrial Average was down 0.2 percent at 44,818.41.
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But the broad-based S&P 500 gained 0.2 percent to 6,043.77, while the tech-rich Nasdaq Composite Index jumped 0.78 percent to 19,361.40.
Early indications are that the US holiday season is off to a good launch. Sales on “Black Friday,” the day after Thanksgiving which kicks off the holiday shopping season, rose 3.4 percent compared with last year, according to Mastercard SpendingPulse.
Among individual companies, Intel jumped 2.9 percent after announcing that Pat Gelsinger had retired as CEO as the chip giant struggles with a turnaround effort after falling behind Nvidia and other rivals.
Disney advanced 0.3 percent following a strong box-office showing for “Moana 2,” the sequel to the animated musical about a spunky Polynesian teenager who embarks on seafaring adventures.
“Moana 2” scored a record $220 million opening over the long Thanksgiving weekend in North America.
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