How major US stock indexes fared Monday 12/12/2022

The Associated Press

Stocks closed higher on Wall Street at the start of a busy week when central banks are likely to unload the year’s final barrage of interest rate hikes. The S&P 500 rallied 1.4% Monday.

On Wednesday, markets expect the Federal Reserve to announce a more modest increase to rates than it has been pushing through recently. Other central banks around the world are also expected to raise rates by half a percentage point this week, including Europe’s.

Higher rates slow the economy and risk causing a recession if they go too high, all while dragging down prices of investments.

On Monday:

The S&P 500 rose 56.18 points, or 1.4%, to 3,990.56.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 528.58 points, or 1.6%, to 34,005.04.

The Nasdaq rose 139.12 points, or 1.3%, to 11,143.74.

The Russell 2000 index of smaller companies rose 21.95 points, or 1.2%, to 1,818.61.

For the year:

The S&P 500 is down 775.62 points, or 16.3%.

The Dow is down 2,333.26 points, or 6.4%.

The Nasdaq is down 4,501.23 points, or 28.8%.

The Russell 2000 is down 426.70 points, or 19%.