US stocks lifted by Buffett deal, oil rally

NEW YORK–US stocks surged Monday as Berkshire Hathaway announced a $37.2 billion acquisition of Precision Castparts and petroleum-linked equities rose on higher oil prices.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average gained 241.79 points (1.39 percent) to 17,615.17

The broad-based S&P 500 jumped 26.61 (1.28 percent) to 2,104.18, while the tech-rich Nasdaq Composite Index advanced 58.25 (1.16 percent) to 5,101.80.

Berkshire’s agreed acquisition of Precision would give Warren Buffett’s conglomerate a maker of complex metal components for the aerospace, chemical processing and oil and gas industries.

Precision jumped 19.1 percent, while Berkshire B shares dipped 0.1 percent.

Dow member Chevron jumped 2.6 percent, EOG Resources rose 3.4 percent and oil-services giant Halliburton plowed up 4.7 percent as oil prices rallied.

Mace Blicksilver, director of Marblehead Asset Management, said he was “not excited” by Monday’s gains, adding that stocks have been in “a very narrow range” and suffered declines last week.

Chinese Internet giant Alibaba rose 2.1 percent on news it will pay 28.3 billion yuan ($4.6 billion) for a near-20 percent stake in consumer electronics retailer Suning. JD.com, a competitor to Suning that lists in the US, tumbled 6.3 percent.

Microblogging company Twitter jumped 9.1 percent as the National Football League announced a deal to deliver official content from the American football league on the Twitter platform. The stock was also lifted by news that founder Jack Dorsey bought about $875,000 worth of Twitter stock.

Apple, which has been in retreat most of the last three weeks, jumped 3.6 percent.

Media companies Disney (+1.5 percent), Time Warner +(2.5 percent) and Viacom (+3.2 percent) rose, as did the solar energy company SunEdison (+4.2 percent). All had suffered deep declines last week.

Dairy company Dean Foods fell 2.9 percent as second-quarter net income came in at $26.5 million, compared with a loss of $645,000 in the year-ago period. Credit Suisse said investors were put off by the unexpected resignation Friday of chairman Tom Davis.

Bond prices fell. The yield on the 10-year US Treasury rose to 2.23 percent from 2.17 percent, while the 30-year advanced to 2.90 percent from 2.83 percent. Bond prices and yields move inversely.