U.S. Stocks Close Modestly Higher After House Pass Infrastructure Bill

(RTTNews) - After an early move to the upside, stocks gave back ground over the course of the trading session on Monday. The major averages pulled back off their best levels but still managed to end the day modestly higher.

The major averages once again finished the session at new record closing highs. The Dow rose 104.27 points or 0.3 percent to 36,432.22, the Nasdaq inched up 10.77 points or 0.1 percent to 15,982.36 and the S&P 500 edged up 4.17 points or 0.1 percent to 4,701.70.

The modest strength on Wall Street partly reflected a positive reaction to news that the House of Representatives has passed a $1 trillion infrastructure bill.

The bill, which was approved in a largely party-line 228-206 vote late Friday, now heads to President Joe Biden's desk for his signature.

However, traders seemed reluctant to make more significant moves amid some uncertainty about the near-term outlook for the markets following the recent upward trend.

A lack of major U.S. economic data also kept some traders on the sidelines ahead of the release of reports on producer and consumer prices and consumer sentiment in the coming days.

Steel stocks moved sharply higher on the news of the long-awaited approval of the infrastructure bill, resulting in a 2.6 percent jump by the NYSE Arca Steel Index.

Significant strength was also visible among oil service stocks, as reflected by the 1.8 percent gain posted by the Philadelphia Oil Service Index.

The advance by oil service stocks came amid an increase by the price of crude oil, with crude for December delivery climbing $0.66 to $81.93 a barrel.

Semiconductor stocks also turned in a strong performance on the day, driving the Philadelphia Semiconductor Index up by 1.3 percent.

On the other hand, networking stocks came under pressure over the course of the session, dragging the NYSE Arca Networking Index down by 1.7 percent.

Utilities stocks also showed a notable move to the downside, with the Dow Jones Utilities Average falling by 1.3 percent.

Other Markets

In overseas trading, stock markets across the Asia-Pacific region moved mostly lower during trading on Monday. Japan's Nikkei 225 Index and Hong Kong's Hang Seng Index both fell by 0.4 percent, while Australia's S&P/ASX 200 Index edged down by 0.1 percent.

Meanwhile, the major European markets ended the day narrowly mixed. While the French CAC 40 Index inched up by 0.1 percent, the U.K.'s FTSE 100 Index and the German DAX Index both dipped by 0.1 percent.

In the bond market, treasuries gave back ground after moving notably higher over the two previous sessions. As a result, the yield on the benchmark ten-year note, which moves opposite of its price, rose by 4.4 basis points to 1.497 percent.

Looking Ahead

Trading on Tuesday may be impacted by reaction to the Labor Department's report on producer prices in the month of October.