Wall Street climbs as North Korea tension eases, S&P tops with 1.12% rise

Investor sentiment lifted by easing tensions after key US officials played down risk of NKorea war

Wall Street opened higher on Monday, with broad gains across sectors, as investor sentiment was lifted by easing tensions in the Korean peninsula after key US officials played down the risk of an imminent war with North Korea.

All the 11 major S&P sectors were higher, with S&P financial's 1.12 per cent rise leading the gainers.

Global stocks lost nearly $1 trillion last week after President Donald Trump warned North Korea that it would face "fire and fury" if it threatened the United States, leading to a war of words between Pyongyang and Washington.

However, US officials including National Security Adviser H R McMaster and CIA Director Mike Pompeo played down the risk on Sunday, while South Korea's president said resolving Pyongyang's nuclear ambitions must be done peacefully.

 

"Feels as though the North Korean tension seems to be abating a bit, with commentary coming out of China and the United States. But the situation seems to have de-escalated in the near term", said Art Hogan, chief market strategist at Wunderlich Securities.

"After the one and a half percent self-off last week, we got a bit of an investor attitude to buy the dip," Hogan said.

At 9:39 am ET (1339 GMT), the Dow Jones industrial average was up 129.25 points, or 0.59 per cent, at 21,987.57 and the S&P 500 was up 19.63 points, or 0.80 per cent, at 2,460.95.

The Nasdaq Composite was up 61.57 points, or 0.98 per cent, at 6,318.12.

Oil prices fell as a slowdown in Chinese refining raised concerns about demand in the world's second-biggest consumer, while an increase in US drilling capacity could deepen a global supply glut.

Among stocks, Tesla rose 2.35 per cent after two brokerages raised their price targets on the stock, citing the potential success of the company's Model 3 sedan.

JD.com, China's second-largest e-commerce firm, was off 4.8 per cent after reporting a wider net loss due to higher marketing costs.

Alibaba was up about 0.96 per cent after Dan Loeb's Third Point bought 4.5 million shares in the Chinese e-commerce giant.

Netflix shares were down 0.86 per cent after Barron's reported on Saturday that the stock could drop by more than half by the end of the decade as Walt Disney plans its own streaming service and Amazon looms.

Advancing issues outnumbered decliners on the NYSE by 2,250 to 376. On the Nasdaq, 1,920 issues rose and 518 fell.