Utilities Help Pull Stocks Higher After Early Fall

TIM PARADIS

NEW YORK (AP) — Stocks bounced back from early losses to post moderate gains as traders funneled money into utility and financial stocks.

Major market indexes ended at their highest levels in nearly a year.

Stocks slid at the open following a drop in overseas markets on worries that a trade war would erupt between the U.S. and China. But the market recovered from an early dip that sent the Dow Jones industrial average down 69 points as investors seized on the opportunity to inject new money into shares. The Dow ended with a gain of 21 points.

Utility AES Corp. helped pull the market higher after The Wall Street Journal reported that China's investment arm is interested in buying a stake in the company.

Analysts said the market's gains are impressive because the Standard & Poor's 500 index has already jumped 55.1 percent in six months.

"We open lower and buyers seem to chip away, and we climb higher," said Adam Gould, senior portfolio manager at Direxion Funds in New York. "It's somewhat healthy that we're rallying this way — slowly."