The Nasdaq on Monday closed above 5,000 for the first time since the year 2000 dot-com bubble as tech stocks were boosted by deals, while the S&P 500 and Dow indexes hit records after economic data pointed to a slowly accelerating economy. After oscillating around it for much of the day, the Nasdaq composite index gained steam in the late afternoon to finish firmly above the milestone, marking the third time the index ended above 5,000. The last time was March 10, 2000.
“You’ve an entirely different make-up of stocks. Real earnings and revenue are driving the Nasdaq now,” said Douglas Depietro, managing director at Evercore ISI in New York. “Anything with a website went to $100 back then.” Its biggest driver on Monday was Google Inc and it was boosted heavily by chipmakers NXP Semiconductors NV and Intel Corp, as well as network equipment maker Cisco Systems Inc after news of two big deals.
Shares of NXP rose 17.3 percent to $99.56 after it agreed to buy smaller peer Freescale Semiconductor Ltd to create a company valued over $40 billion. Freescale rose 11.8 percent to $40.36. Hewlett-Packard Co said it would buy Wi-Fi gear maker Aruba Networks Inc for about $2.7 billion, the biggest deal for the world’s No. 2 PC maker since 2011. Rival Cisco rose 2.3 percent to $30.19.
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