The US markets settled higher on Monday ahead of the Federal Reserve's monetary policy announcement on Wednesday. With the Fed widely expected to leave interest rates unchanged, traders are likely to focus more closely on the central bank's accompanying statement and projections. Optimism the Fed could pivot to cutting interest rates as soon as March 2024 has contributed to recent strength on markets, although last Friday's strong than expected jobs data has led to speculation the Fed could wait until May to begin lowering rates. On the sectoral front, semiconductor stocks moved sharply higher on the day, driving the Philadelphia Semiconductor Index up by 3.4 percent to its best closing level in almost two years. Considerable strength was also visible among networking stocks, as reflected by the 2.5 percent gain posted by the NYSE Arca Networking Index.
Transportation stocks also showed a strong move to the upside over the course of the session, with the Dow Jones Transportation Average climbing by 1.2 percent. Meanwhile, gold stocks moved lower along with the price of the precious metal, dragging the NYSE Arca Gold Bugs Index down by 1.1 percent. Among individual stocks, chares of Macy's (M) moved sharply higher following reports an investor group consisting of Arkhouse Management and Brigade Capital has offered to acquire the department store chain for $5.8 billion. Health insurer Cigna (CI) also surged after reportedly abandoning efforts to acquire rival Humana (HUM) and announcing a $10 billion increase in its share repurchase authorization.
Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 157.06 points or 0.43 percent to 36,404.93, Nasdaq surged 28.51 points or 0.2 percent to 14,432.49 and S&P 500 was up by 18.07 points 0.39 percent to 4,622.44.
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