The stock exchanges in New York ended Monday with solid gains. After a rigid half-trade day on Black Friday, retailers on Cyber Monday were noticing clear signs. In addition, automaker General Motors (GM) was rewarded by investors after the announcement of a major reorganization.
The leading Dow-Jones index ended 1.4 percent higher at 24,640.24 points. The broader composite S & P 500 gained 1.6 percent at 2673.45 points. Technology index Nasdaq climbed 2.1 percent to 7081.85 points.
Amongst others, web retailers such as Amazon and Alibaba did well with almost 5.3 percent gains. Other retail stores such as Kohl’s, Macy’s and Target also benefited from the crowds at the start of the holiday season. Those stocks rose as much as 2.9 percent.
GM announced that it plans to close five factories in North America and two elsewhere and rose 4.8 percent. In addition, more than 14,000 jobs will be removed. The reorganization should lead to a cost saving, which will give GM more opportunities to invest in electric vehicles. Other automakers such as Fiat Chrysler and Tesla also went up.
Apple rose 1.4 percent, despite the fact that the Supreme Court cleared the way for a case against the company because of possible abuse of power in determining prices in its App Store. Apple was briefly overtaken by Microsoft during the trading day as the most valuable company in the US. Microsoft itself added 3.3 percent, but had to surrender the lead to Apple quite quickly.
Oil prices made the biggest increase in five months on hopes about an agreement that should do something about global overproduction. A barrel of American oil cost 2.6 percent more at $51.70. Brent oil rose 3.1 percent in price to $60.62 per barrel.
Pharmacy company CVS Health (up 3.5 percent) was granted green light from the State of New York to take over health insurance company Aetna (up 2.3 percent). All states that had something to say about the takeover are now in agreement.
The euro was worth $1.1334, against $1.1339 earlier in the day at the closing of the European stock markets.
