NEW YORK (AP) – U.S. stocks rose slightly in morning trading Monday as investors looked ahead to a busy week for earnings news and a meeting by the Federal Reserve on interest rates.
The slight gains follow big ones last week. The Standard & Poor’s 500 index rose to yet another record, and the Nasdaq finally climbed back from its losses in dot-com crash to hit its first high in fifteen years.
KEEPING SCORE: The Dow Jones industrial average rose 32 points, or 0.2 percent, to 18,112 as of 11:07 a.m. Eastern time. The S&P 500 rose two points, or 0.1 percent, to 2,119. The Nasdaq composite climbed five points, or 0.1 percent, to 5,097.
EYE ON EARNINGS: More than 150 companies in the S&P 500 are expected to report quarterly results this week, including Ford, Visa, Pfizer and Exxon Mobil. Investors are anxious because falling oil prices and a strengthening dollar have hammered first-quarter results at some companies. Per-share earnings for the S&P 500 are expected to fall 1 percent from a year earlier, according to S&P Capital IQ, a provider of financial data. That would be the first drop since 2009.
EYE ON APPLE: Apple rose $2.49, or 2 percent, $132.73 as investors waited for quarterly results due out after U.S. markets close. The world’s No. 1 company by market value is being closely watched for signs of how its new Apple Watches are doing.