NEW YORK (Reuters) – The S&P 500 closed barely higher, eking out a nominal gain on Monday as investors weighed new spikes in coronavirus infections with expectations that an economy crippled by mandated shutdowns will soon be re-opened for business.
Technology and healthcare shares provided the biggest lift to all three major U.S. stock indexes and led the tech-heavy Nasdaq to its sixth consecutive advance.
The blue-chip Dow lost ground.
The S&P 500 and Dow Jones Industrial Average remain within 20% of all-time highs reached in February, and the tech-heavy Nasdaq is within 10% of its closing record.
Indeed, despite bleak recent economic data, including Friday’s 20.2 million drop in U.S. payrolls, Wall Street has gained in recent weeks as investors look beyond pandemic to recovery.
“Investors have been buying equities given the realistic expectation that massive fiscal and monetary stimulus will reignite economic and profit growth,” said David Carter, chief investment officer at Lenox Wealth Advisors in New York. “There is still a fair amount of optimism in the markets, but this could be quelled if coronavirus cases re-emerge.”
But a surge of new coronavirus infections in Germany and South Korea suggested early efforts to