Investing.com – U.S. stocks closed mostly higher on Monday, as the risk-on trade continued into the month of May, despite the release of bearish economic data and comments from President Donald Trump.
U.S. stocks shrugged off comments from President Donald Trump, who said on Monday that he's considering breaking up the big Wall Street banks.
“I’m looking at that right now,” Trump said Monday in an interview with Bloomberg. “There’s some people that want to go back to the old system, right? So we’re going to look at that.”
After an initial dip, banking stocks recovered to close near session highs. Goldman Sachs Group Inc (NYSE:GS), Bank of America Corporation (NYSE:BAC), and Wells Fargo & Company (NYSE:WFC) closed in positive territory for the session.
Meanwhile, weaker than expected manufacturing and construction spending data failed to have a meaningful impact on sentiment as investors look ahead to a slew of important economic data expected later this week.
The Institute for Supply Management (ISM) said its index of national factory activity dropped to a reading of 54.8 last month, the weakest reading since December, from 57.2 in March.
In a separate report, the Commerce Department said U.S. construction spending slipped 0.2 percent for the month of March. Analysts' had forecast a slower decline to 0.4% from 1.8% a month earlier.
Several key economic data are scheduled to be released later this week, including nonfarm payrolls for April and a Fed rate decision, which is widely expected to remain unchanged.
On the corporate earnings front, investors anticipated a quarterly earnings release from Apple Inc (NASDAQ:AAPL), after the U.S. markets close on Tuesday.
Apple is expected to report fiscal second quarter earnings per share of $2.01 on revenues of $52.6 billion.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average 0.13% lower at 20,913. The S&P 500 gained 0.17% and the Nasdaq Composite closed an all-time high of 6091.60, up 0.73%.
The ‘Bulls and Bears’ on Wall Street
The top Dow gainers included; Apple Inc (NASDAQ:AAPL) up 2%, and Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ:MSFT) up 1.4%, while McDonald’s Corporation (NYSE:MCD) added 0.9%.
Boeing Co (NYSE:BA) down 1.3%, Home Depot Inc (NYSE:HD) down 1.2% and International Business Machines (NYSE:IBM) down 0.9%, were among the worst Dow performers of the session.