Renewed appetite for taking risks drives stock markets

Stocks closed higher on Wall Street on Monday, and the broad rally helped the S&P 500 claw back more than half of its losses over the past two weeks.

The S&P 500 index rose 1% or 41.19 points to 4,197.05. The index is now on track for a 0.4% monthly gain. The Dow Jones Industrial Average added 186.14 points, or 0.5%, to 34,393.98. The tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite gained 190.18 points, or 1.4%, to 13,661.17.

Smaller company stocks also notched gains. The Russell 2000 index picked up 12.07 points, or 0.5%, to 2,227.34.

The current earnings reporting season is near its end, and companies have been reporting strong results for the first quarter. That has helped reaffirm Wall Street’s view that the economic recovery is solid. It has also helped to justify some of the pricey stock values in several sectors, especially technology. Investors will get results from Dell and Salesforce.com this week, among a few others.

Technology stocks accounted for a big share of the upward move in the market Monday, with semiconductor companies among the big gainers. Nvidia rose 4.1%, while Micron Technology added 2.7%. Among communication stocks, Facebook gained 2.7% and Twitter jumped 4.8%

There are only a handful of economic reports this week, including monthly data on new home sales and prices.

On Friday, investors will get another reading on inflation in the form of the Commerce Department’s personal consumption and expenditures index. “Core PCE,” as it is known, is the preferred way Federal Reserve policymakers choose to measure inflation in the U.S. instead of the more widely known consumer price index that’s reported earlier in the month.

The yield on the 10-year Treasury note fell to 1.60% from 1.63% Friday.

Virgin Galactic jumped 27.6% after the company made its first rocket-powered flight from New Mexico to the fringe of space in a manned shuttle over the weekend.