US stocks rose on Wednesday after Greece's prime minister signalled he was prepared to accept most of creditors' bailout terms and a raft of US data pointed to a stronger economy. Adding to the positive tone, financial stocks rallied after Swiss insurance giant ACE snagged a deal to buy upmarket property insurer Chubb for $28.3 billion.
Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras made his new offer a day after the country became the first advanced nation to default on an IMF loan. "Investors are taking a collective sigh of relief that an armageddon type of scenario did not occur with respect to Greece," said Adam Sarhan, chief executive of Sarhan Capital in New York.
"The markets are also rallying from deeply oversold level." US private employers added 237,000 jobs in June, the biggest gain since December, while construction spending rose in May to its highest level in just over 6-1/2 years. The US Federal Reserve has said it will raise rates only if it sees a sustained recovery in the economy. "As long as the Fed raises rates because there is economic expansion and not because of inflation, it is a positive for equities because that means corporations can continue to grow earnings," said Peter Cardillo, chief market economist at Rockwell Global Capital in New York. At 11:32 am EDT (1532 GMT) the Dow Jones industrial average was up 133.08 points, or 0.76 percent, at 17,752.59, the S&P 500 was up 14.78 points, or 0.72 percent, at 2,077.89 and the Nasdaq Composite was up 34.37 points, or 0.69 percent, at 5,021.23.