Stocks rose sharply Monday morning as business optimism improved and news of a coronavirus vaccine supported gains across the board.
By midday ET, the Dow Jones was up 834 points with gains of more than 3% on the index. A wide variety of companies in multiple industries saw gains as an experimental Covid-19 vaccine made progress.
While a $3 trillion stimulus bill is set to stall in the Senate, there is growing optimism in the business community that the worst of the pandemic may be behind us. Following 1.5 million cases of coronavirus and lockdowns across the U.S., unemployment is forecast to reach 25% in a worse case scenario. However, with businesses slowly returning to normal, job hires could soar with temporary and full-time workers being re-hired.
By midday, the Nasdaq Composite Index rose 2.5%. This follows a late surge on Friday with stock markets seeing positive rallies.
Among stocks that surged Monday include Hertz Global Holdings Inc, Uber and Moderna. Shares in drugmaker Moderna were up 22%.
News of early positive results on human trials for an experimental coronavirus vaccine looked promising.
Could this just be the beginning of a sustained stock market rally?
