S&P 500 Performance

Investing.com — The S&P 500 closed higher Tuesday in thin trading ahead of the Christmas holiday, as tech stocks continued their strong start to the week.

At 1:00 p.m. ET (18:00 GMT), the S&P 500 rose 1.1%, the Nasdaq 100 added 1.4%, while the Dow Jones Industrial Average gained 0.9%, or 350 points.

The New York Stock Exchange is set to close early Tuesday for Christmas Eve, and the market is shut on Christmas Day.

Tech Adds to Strong Week

Tech stocks bolstered their strong start to the week with the so-called Mag 7, including Apple Inc (NASDAQ:AAPL), Amazon.com Inc (NASDAQ:AMZN), Meta Platforms Inc (NASDAQ:META), Alphabet Inc Class A (NASDAQ:GOOGL), and Tesla Inc (NASDAQ:TSLA) climbing, although NVIDIA Corporation (NASDAQ:NVDA) traded flat.

Chip stocks that gained on the previous day remained marginally higher after the Biden administration launched a new trade investigation into Chinese-made legacy chips, potentially leading to fresh tariffs on Chinese semiconductors.

American Airlines Recovers After Briefly Halting Flights

American Airlines Group (NASDAQ:AAL) shares were flat, recovering from an intraday loss Tuesday as the airline briefly grounded all flights in the U.S. due to a "technical issue" which was later resolved.

Novo Nordisk A/S (NYSE:NVO) slipped, halting its recovery from a recent plunge due to disappointing results from a late-stage study of its weight loss drug.

Clients Continue to Buy US Equities – BofA

BofA Securities reported that clients continued to buy US equities for the seventh straight week, with inflows reaching $10 billion — the second-largest amount since 2008 and the biggest since January 2017.

Purchases were spread across individual stocks and exchange-traded funds (ETFs), with stronger inflows directed toward single stocks. Large-cap stocks saw the bulk of buying activity, while small caps experienced more subdued inflows.

Both institutional and retail investors increased their equity holdings for another week — the third consecutive week for institutions and the second for retail clients, while hedge funds were net sellers for the second week running.

The rolling four-week average of inflows from institutional clients reached its highest point in nine months, indicating renewed buying following October’s tax-loss selling by mutual funds.

BofA strategists led by Jill Carey Hall noted, "Private clients typically are big sellers in December amid tax loss selling vs. big net buyers in January. While this group has been a buyer of ETFs this month, they have sold single stocks, though slightly less than in an average December."

*(Peter Nurse, Ayushman Ojha contributed to this article.)