FINANCIAL MARKETS
NEW YORK—U.S. stocks rose for the fourth day in a row Tuesday as they continued to recover the ground they lost last week. Major indexes approached record highs again. Most of the gains went to banks, which surged as bond yields jumped. That will allow them to charge higher rates on loans. Banks took steep losses last Wednesday, when stocks had their worst day since September. The four-day rally has restored most of the market’s losses and the Standard & Poor’s 500 index is almost back to record highs. The S&P 500 added 4.40 points, or 0.2 percent, to 2,398.42. The Dow Jones industrial average edged up 43.08 points, or 0.2 percent, to 20,937.91. The Nasdaq composite rose 5.09 points, or 0.1 percent, to 6,138.71. The Russell 2000 index of small-company stocks gained 3.84 points, or 0.3 percent, to 1,380.98. Bond prices turned lower. The yield on the 10-year Treasury note rose to 2.28 percent from 2.25 percent. That helped bank stocks like JPMorgan Chase, which gained $1.06, or 1.3 percent, to $85.76 and BB&T, which rose 63 cents, or 1.5 percent, to $43.03. Sales of new homes fell 11 percent in April from the month before, the biggest drop in more than two years. Sales had reached a nine-year high in March, and experts said the decline was most likely a blip. Homebuilder NVR fell $61.27, or 2.6 percent, to $2,296 and D.R. Horton lost 54 cents, or 1.6 percent, to $33.37. Home improvement retailer Lowe’s lost $1.71, or 2 percent, to $82.34 and Home Depot also slipped. Fiat Chrysler sank after the U.S. government sued the automaker, saying some of diesel pickup trucks and Jeep SUVs included software that cheated emissions tests. The Department of Justice said the software let the vehicles’ engines emit more pollution on the road than during Environmental Protection Agency lab testing.
Fiat Chrysler stock lost 44 cents, or 4.1 percent, to $10.32. Benchmark U.S. crude oil added 34 cents to $51.47 a barrel in New York. Brent crude, used to price international oils, picked up 28 cents to $54.15 a barrel in London. Wholesale gasoline remained at $1.66 a gallon and heating oil finished where it started, at $1.61 a gallon. Natural gas sank 11 cents, or 3.3 percent, to $3.22 per 1,000 cubic feet.
Gold fell $5.90 to $1,255.50 an ounce. Silver lost 5 cents to $17.14 an ounce. Copper remained at $2.60 a pound. The dollar rose to 111.76 yen from 111.20 yen. The euro declined to $1.1185 from $1.1234.