US stocks rose at the open after comments from the president of the San Francisco Fed suggested the central bank was not done taking action to stimulate the economy.
A pessimistic outlook from Caterpillar (CAT.N) capped gains and some investors cautioned the advance may be due to window- dressing for the end of the quarter. .N
U.S. stocks were supported by a private sector report showing U.S. consumer confidence jumped to its highest level in seven months in September as Americans were more optimistic about the job market and income prospects. The MSCI world equity index .MIWD00000PUS rose 0.37 percent to 337.38. European shares .FTEU3 gained 0.26 percent.
“A lot of people are buying equities today because they’ve been underexposed to the market. It isn’t necessarily a call on fundamentals,” said Nicholas Colas, chief market strategist at the ConvergEx Group in New York.
“Money managers who haven’t believed in the rally don’t want to compound that error by showing a lack of exposure at the end of the quarter.”
The Dow Jones industrial average .DJI was up 49.96 points, or 0.37 percent, at 13,608.88. The Standard & Poor’s 500 Index .SPX was up 4.83 points, or 0.33 percent, at 1,461.72. The Nasdaq Composite Index .IXIC was up 9.82 points, or 0.31 percent, at 3,170.60.
Caterpillar shares (CAT.N) fell 2.3 percent at the New York open. Just minutes before markets closed on Monday, Caterpillar Inc cut its 2015 profit outlook, warning that weaker commodity prices would result in a bigger-than-expected decline in demand.
“Caterpillar is another global-reaching firm that’s speaking negatively to the pace of the economy, and with slow-downs in Europe and Asia, this is something we should get used to,” said Art Hogan, managing director of Lazard Capital Markets in New York.
U.S. data showed single-family home prices rose for a sixth month in a row in July, though the improvement was not as strong as expected and had minimal impact on trading.
The benchmark 10-year Treasury note yield was last at 1.7181 percent, compared with 1.706 percent shortly before the release of the home price report from S&P/Case-Shiller.
The euro rose 0.2 percent at $1.2951, still some two cents from the 4-1/2-month peak posted last week when the U.S. Federal Reserve announced further quantitative easing. Gains were sparked by a media report that Bundesbank lawyers were checking the legality of the European Central Bank’s bond-buying plan.
Oil drew some support from the rise in tensions in the Middle East.
Washington on Monday cleared the path for tighter sanctions against Iran to curb its nuclear ambitions, while Tehran renewed its rhetoric against Israel, intensifying worries about a conflict between the two, which could have an impact on crude supplies from the region.
These worries sent Brent crude futures up 1 percent to $110.91 per barrel.
