Investing.com – U.S. equities were higher at the close on Tuesday, as gains in the Oil & Gas, Financials and Healthcare sectors propelled shares higher.
At the close in NYSE, the Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 0.90%, while the S&P 500 index added 1.06%, and the NASDAQ Composite index climbed 0.87%.
The biggest gainers of the session on the Dow Jones Industrial Average were Exxon Mobil Corporation (N:XOM), which rose 4.47% or 3.40 points to trade at 79.43 at the close. Chevron Corporation (N:CVX) added 3.84% or 3.43 points to end at 92.76 and Goldman Sachs Group Inc (N:GS) was up 3.18% or 5.61 points to 182.01 in late trade.
Biggest losers included 3M Company (N:MMM), which lost 6.03% or 9.50 points to trade at 148.13 in late trade. EI du Pont de Nemours and Company (N:DD) declined 2.09% or 1.42 points to end at 66.50 and Apple Inc (O:AAPL) shed 1.77% or 1.99 points to 110.49.
The top performers on the S&P 500 were Ensco PLC (N:ESV) which rose 7.97% to 16.40, Illumina Inc (O:ILMN) which was up 6.65% to settle at 186.28 and Mallinckrodt (N:MNK) which gained 6.39% to close at 73.64.
The worst performers were 3M Company (N:MMM) which was down 6.03% to 148.13 in late trade, Chesapeake Energy Corporation (N:CHK) which lost 6.00% to settle at 3.76 and Cabot Oil & Gas Corporation (N:COG) which was down 3.96% to 15.03 at the close.
The top performers on the NASDAQ Composite were Wave Systems Corp (O:WAVX) which rose 59.93% to 0.190, Truett Hurs (O:THST) which was up 33.87% to settle at 1.66 and Metabolix Inc (O:MBLX) which gained 32.58% to close at 1.750.
The worst performers were Neothetics Inc (O:NEOT) which was down 81.64% to 1.31 in late trade, Ceres Inc (O:CERE) which lost 33.61% to settle at 0.325 and TOP SHIPS Inc (O:TOPS) which was down 23.08% to 0.350 at the close.
Advancing stocks outnumbered falling ones by 2609 to 843 and 6 ended unchanged; on the Nasdaq Stock Exchange, 1844 rose and 808 declined, while 48 ended unchanged on the New York Stock Exchange.
The CBOE Volatility Index, which measures the implied volatility of S&P 500 options, was down 6.86% to 21.17.
In commodities trading, Gold for February delivery was down 0.34% or 3.60 to $1059.80 a troy ounce. Meanwhile, Crude oil for delivery in January rose 2.16% or 0.79 to hit $37.09 a barrel, while the February Brent oil contract rose 1.13% or 0.43 to trade at $38.59 a barrel.
EUR/USD was down 0.58% to 1.0929, while USD/JPY rose 0.55% to 121.69.
The US Dollar Index was up 0.50% at 98.22.