US: Stocks rebound from Omicron-induced plunge

[NEW YORK] Wall Street stocks jumped on Monday, winning back some of the prior session's losses on hopes that vaccines and therapeutics will limit the impact of the latest Covid-19 variant.

Major indices tumbled more than two per cent on Friday on worries the Omicron variant could derail the global economic recovery.

But investors appeared less concerned on Monday as vaccine makers Pfizer and Johnson & Johnson signaled they were already working on a potential formula targeted at the new strain.

"The consensus is that Friday, the market probably overdid" the losses, said Art Hogan, chief strategist at National Securities.

"We have seen that new variant and new waves of Covid infection seem to have a diminishing economic impact because of the level of vaccinations and boosters."

The Dow Jones Industrial Average finished at 35,135.94, up 0.7 per cent.

The broad-based S&P 500 gained 1.3 per cent to 4,655.27, while the tech-rich Nasdaq Composite Index jumped 1.9 per cent to 15,782.83.

Markets are awaiting a trove of economic data this week, including readings on the manufacturing and services sector as well as the November jobs report.

Among individual companies, Twitter dropped 2.3 per cent as co-founder Jack Dorsey stepped down as chief executive.

Twitter's chief technical officer Parag Agrawal will replace Dorsey in the top post, the company said, while the departing co-founder will remain a member of the board until his term expires at the 2022 meeting of stockholders.

AFP