Stocks open with gains as stimulus talks hang in balance

Stocks took gains Monday as the fate of coronavirus relief negotiations between the Trump administration and House Democrats remained up in the air with less than four weeks until Election Day.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average closed with a gain of 302 points, rising 1 percent. The Nasdaq composite closed with a gain of 3.3 percent, and the S&P 500 index rose nearly 2.1 percent.

The stock market has risen steadily since President Trump abruptly reversed his decision last week to end negotiations with Democrats over another round of stimulus and pandemic response spending. 

Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin on Friday extended a $1.8 trillion offer to Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.), the most expensive Republican offer to date. But Pelosi and top Democratic leaders called the offer insufficient to meet the needs of the crisis, while Senate Republicans ripped it as too costly.

Trump and his top White House advisers have generally been supportive of a higher price tag for a stimulus bill than the more fiscally conservative Senate. Larry Kudlow, the president’s top economic adviser, has waived off concerns that a Trump-Pelosi agreement could get blown up on the Senate floor.

“I think if an agreement can be reached, they will go along with it,” Kudlow said Sunday in an interview with CNN’s “State of the Union.”

Updated 4:29 p.m.