U.S. stocks trade higher ahead of Fed meeting

Source: Xinhua| 2017-09-19 00:10:48|Editor: huaxia
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NEW YORK, Sept. 18 (Xinhua) -- U.S. stocks traded higher on Monday as investors were awaiting a closely-watched Federal Reserve meeting scheduled for later this week.

At midday, the Dow Jones Industrial Average added 79.47 points, or 0.36 percent, to 22,347.81. The S&P 500 gained 6.48 points, or 0.26 percent, to 2,506.71. The Nasdaq Composite Index was up 27.78 points, or 0.43 percent, to 6,476.25.

Fed's two-day monetary meeting will kick off on Tuesday. It is widely expected that the central bank won't raise interest rates in the meeting, but investors are expecting the Fed to announce the unwinding of its 4.5-trillion-U.S.-dollar balance sheet.

Bruce Bittles, chief investment strategist at U.S. investment service firm Baird, said in a note on Monday that the Fed "faces no great urgency to raise the level of Fed funds in 2017 considering inflation remains below Fed targets and given the uncertainty surrounding the economic effects of hurricanes Harvey and Irma."

U.S. stocks notched solid gains last week, with the Dow posting best weekly performance since December, as investors mainly focused on economic data.

Last week, the blue-chip Dow rose 2.16 percent, and the broader S&P 500 was up 1.58 percent, while the tech-heavy Nasdaq rallied 1.39 percent. Enditem

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