Stocks Holding On To Gains In Mid-Day Trading - U.S. Commentary

(RTTNews) - After moving to the upside in early trading, stocks remain mostly positive in mid-day trading on Tuesday. The tech-heavy Nasdaq reached a record intraday early in the session but has given back some ground since then.

Currently, the major averages remain in positive territory. The Dow is up 38.49 points or 0.2 percent at 18,567.91, the Nasdaq is up 22.80 points or 0.4 percent at 5,267.40, and the S&P 500 is up 7.56 points or 0.4 percent at 2,190.20.

The strength on Wall Street reflects recent underlying upward momentum for the markets in spite of concerns about the possibility of a near-term interest rate hike.

On the U.S. economic front, the Commerce Department released a report this morning showing an unexpected jump in new home sales in the month of July.

The report said new home sales jumped 12.4 percent to an annual rate of 654,000 in July from the revised June rate of 582,000.

The sharp increase in new home sales came as a surprise to economists, who had expected new home sales to drop to a rate of 580,000 from the 592,000 originally reported for the previous month.

With the unexpected increase, new home sales reached their highest annual rate since October of 2007.

Following the release of the report, housing stocks have shown a strong move to the upside on the day. Reflecting the strength in the sector, the Philadelphia Housing Sector Index has shot up by 2 percent.

Steel, energy, and electronic storage stocks have also shown notable upward moves, while gold stocks have come under pressure.

In overseas trading, stocks markets across the Asia-Pacific region turned in another mixed performance during trading on Tuesday. Japan's Nikkei 225 Index dropped by 0.6 percent, while China's Shanghai Composite Index rose by 0.2 percent.

Meanwhile, the major European markets all moved to the upside on the day. While the U.K.'s FTSE 100 Index rose by 0.6 percent, the French CAC 40 Index climbed by 0.7 percent and the German DAX Index advanced by 0.9 percent.

In the bond market, treasuries have shown a lack of direction ahead of the Treasury's auction of two-year notes. Subsequently, the yield on the benchmark ten-year note, which moves opposite of its price, is up by less than a basis point at 1.548 percent.