NEW YORK, Oct. 26 (Xinhua) -- U.S. stocks closed higher on Monday, with technology shares leading a rebound from last week's selloff as oil prices pulled back on hopes of easing Middle East tensions.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 146.42 points, or 0.28 percent, to 52,361.58. The S&P 500 added 53.09 points, or 0.7 percent, to 7,676.77. The Nasdaq Composite Index increased 214.04 points, or 0.82 percent, to 26,169.38.
Seven of the 11 primary S&P 500 sectors ended in green, with technology and industrials leading the gainers by adding 1.5 percent and 1.4 percent, respectively. Communication services and consumer staples led the laggards, falling 1.42 percent and 0.13 percent, respectively.
Oil prices pulled back on hopes of de-escalation in the Middle East. West Texas Intermediate crude settled at 101.76 U.S. dollars a barrel, down 1.46 percent, while Brent crude settled at 115.81 dollars a barrel, down 0.78 percent. The pullback followed reports that Qatari mediators were in Tehran to advance a U.S.-coordinated de-escalation, and U.S. President Donald Trump said Sunday there would be no strike on Iran that day.
On the corporate front, Anthropic publicly filed its prospectus for an initial public offering on Monday, seeking to list on the Nasdaq under the ticker symbol ANT in mid-November. Anthropic's revenues totaled 16.29 billion dollars in the first half of 2026, up from 1.16 billion dollars a year earlier, with a net loss of 80.7 billion dollars driven largely by non-cash charges. Its backers have talked of a valuation of about 1.5 trillion dollars.
Chip stocks led the rebound, with Nvidia rising 2.39 percent, while Arm Holdings and Synopsys jumped more than 6 percent and 5 percent, respectively. Tesla rose 5.21 percent to 391.62 dollars after Barclays upgraded the stock to "overweight" and raised its price target to 450 dollars from 370 dollars, citing a possible premium from a combination with SpaceX.
"Overall, the numbers are showing massive eye popping growth from a broadening group of customers as ANT aggressively goes after the enterprise market in this AI Revolution," said Dan Ives of Wedbush Securities.
Meanwhile, Verizon fell about 3.5 percent despite beating earnings expectations. Verizon posted 34.31 billion dollars of revenues, missing estimates even though it added 406,000 postpaid phone customers, its best third quarter in five years. Netflix fell nearly 3 percent and Merck was the Dow's worst laggard, down more than 3 percent.
On the economic front, the Dallas Federal Reserve's Texas Manufacturing Index rose to 13.4 in October from 9.8 in September, beating expectations of 7, though its production index fell 14 points. The Federal Reserve is in its pre-meeting quiet period ahead of Wednesday's decision, with traders pricing about a 90-percent chance policymakers will hold rates steady at 3.75 percent to 4 percent, according to CME FedWatch. ■
