By Mucahithan Avcioglu
ISTANBUL (AA) - US stocks closed with gains Monday, as hopes for an end to the longest government shutdown in US history increased after the Senate voted over the weekend to advance a House-passed measure to fund the government.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 0.81%, or 381.53 points, to close at 47,368.63.
The Nasdaq climbed 2.27%, or 522.64 points, to 23,527.17, while the S&P 500 surged 1.54%, or 103.63 points, to 6,832.43.
The Volatility Index (VIX), also known as the "fear index," dropped 7.76% to 17.60.
The positive course was mainly fueled by investor optimism for an end to the federal government shutdown after Sunday's US Senate vote by Democrats and Republicans towards reaching an agreement on a temporary budget to reopen the government.
The US Senate voted 60-40 to break a Democratic filibuster and advance government funding legislation, marking a crucial step toward reopening the federal government after a five-week shutdown.
A final vote in the Senate on the funding bill will need to be held, followed by passage by the House and approval by President Trump.
According to a University of Michigan report issued Friday, concerns about the shutdown have caused US consumer sentiment to drop to its lowest point in almost three years, slightly above its lowest point ever.
Many important economic indicators such as the consumer and producer price indices, which were supposed to be released this week, are no longer being released by federal agencies because of the shutdown.
Due to a shortage of air traffic controllers, the shutdown also resulted in thousands of flight delays and cancellations, and Trump threatened to deduct air traffic controllers' pay for missing work.
“All Air Traffic Controllers must get back to work, NOW!!!,” he said in a post on his Truth Social platform, adding that air traffic controllers who didn't take any time off during the shutdown should receive bonuses of $10,000.
He said the others would be "docked" if they didn't get back to work immediately.
Some tech stocks, which saw losses last week amid concerns about high valuations, rose as expectations of a government reopening increased investor risk appetite.
Nvidia's shares rose nearly 6%, Tesla and Alphabet's shares gained nearly 4%, and Microsoft, Amazon and Meta gained nearly 2%.
Meanwhile, Coinbase, which announced that it would launch a token sale platform and allow individual investors in the US to participate in these sales for the first time since 2018, saw its shares rise nearly 3%.