Monday, 23 March 2015 19:55
NEW YORK: US stocks edged higher on Monday following strong gains in major indexes the previous week, as investors assessed gyrations in the dollar and crude prices and their impact on equities.
Energy stocks were among the largest gainers as crude oil prices changed course to trade higher as the greenback weakened further.
The action in the dollar has closely affected stocks of late as traders focus on the Federal Reserve and its expected monetary policy tightening sometime later this year. The 20-day correlation between the dollar index and the S&P 500 sits at -0.79. The dollar index was down 0.7 percent on the day.
“The market has been in a back-and-forth motion for the last couple of weeks, caught between the potential for rising interest rates and its impact on the dollar and the feeling by investors that the economy is gaining some strength,” said Rick Meckler, president of LibertyView Capital Management in Jersey City, New Jersey.
He said, equity traders were “maybe a little bit too focused” on the daily dollar moves and the impact of a stronger greenback on earnings was not entirely clear.
At 9:56 a.m. EDT (1356 GMT) the Dow Jones industrial average rose 45.61 points, or 0.25 percent, to 18,173.26, the S&P 500 gained 2.93 points, or 0.14 percent, to 2,111.03 and the Nasdaq Composite dropped 10.19 points, or 0.2 percent, to 5,016.23.
The S&P 500 energy sector rose 0.7 percent as Brent reversed a slide to gain 0.9 percent, while U.S. crude added 0.4 percent even after top exporter Saudi Arabia said it would only mull cutting output if producers outside OPEC do so as well.
Gilead Sciences shares fell 2 percent to $ 100.24 after a report by Bloomberg said the company told healthcare providers nine patients taking its hepatitis C drugs along with a heart treatment developed abnormally slow heartbeats and one died of cardiac arrest.
Immunogen rallied 14.4 percent to $ 8.51 after it licensed Japan-based Takeda Pharmaceutical to develop and commercialize anticancer therapies.
The Nasdaq Biotech index fell for the first time in nine sessions, down 2.5 percent, after running up nearly 20 percent from its February low.
Advancing issues outnumbered declining ones on the NYSE by 1,839 to 958, for a 1.92-to-1 ratio; on the Nasdaq, 1,234 issues fell and 1,168 advanced for a 1.06-to-1 ratio favoring decliners.
The S&P 500 was posting 41 new 52-week highs and 1 new low; the Nasdaq Composite was recording 67 new highs and 12 new lows.
Copyright Reuters, 2015
