Wall Street today: US stocks rise as investors focus on earnings, economic data

US stocks rose on Monday to add to their all-time high s, as investors focused on earnings and economic data later in the week.

As of 12:51 pm Eastern time, the S&P 500 was up 0.8 per cent, the Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 0.4 per cent, and the Nasdaq Composite was up 0.9 per cent.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 42.89 points, or 0.10 per cent, to 42,820.42, the S&P 500 gained 29.72 points, or 0.51 per cent, to 5,844.75 and the Nasdaq Composite gained 158.43 points, or 0.86 per cent, to 18,501.37.

As of 9:33 am Eastern time, the S&P 500 was 0.3 per cent higher, the Nasdaq Composite was up 0.6 per cent, and the Dow Jones Industrial Average was down 0.3 per cent.

This week's calendar includes September US retail sales and earnings reports from Netflix, Goldman Sachs and Procter & Gamble.

Bank of America, Johnson and Johnson and UnitedHealth Group will all report their quarter results on Tuesday.

Boeing shares dropped 1 per cent after it announced on Friday that it plans to cut 10 per cent of its global staff and delay the launch of the 777X. 

Shares of Nvidia gained 2.5 per cent, Apple rose 1.1 per cent, and Microsoft added 0.9 per cent.

Caterpillar dipped 1.5 per cent after Morgan Stanley downgraded the equipment maker to "underweight" from "equal weight".

Energy shares fell 0.2 per cent on lower oil prices.

The US bond market was closed on Monday because of a holiday.

Crude oil

Oil prices declined about 2 per cent on Monday after China oil imports fell for the fifth month and on cut in 2024 and 2025 global oil demand growth by the OPEC.

Brent crude futures were down $1.50, or 1.9 per cent, at $77.54 per barrel by 1213 GMT, while US West Texas Intermediate crude futures fell $1.53, or 2%, to $74.03 per barrel.

Bullion

Gold prices edged higher on Monday as investors assessed China's weekend stimulus announcement.

Spot gold rose 0.2 per cent to $2,660.64 per ounce by 0800 GMT. US gold futures were steady at $2,677.90.

Spot silver fell 0.2 per cent to $31.48 per ounce.