While you were sleeping: UPDATED Dow hits record high as finance stocks rally

Wall Street's post-US election rally continues, bolstered by financial stocks, while oil prices slid for the first time since Opec's agreement to lower output.

At the close, the Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 35.54 points, or 0.2%, to 19,251.78, a new high, while the Nasdaq Composite Index added 0.45% to 5333.00 and the Standard & Poor's 500 Index gained 0.3% to 2212.23.

The Dow moved higher as gains by Verizon Communications and Goldman Sachs outweighed slides in Nike and Visa shares.

Wells Fargo shares rose 1.4% after chief executive Tim Sloan said the bank's profits were likely to be hit in the short term by higher interest rates but that longer term the hike would be beneficial, according to Reuters.

"You've got a lot of overbought individual components, especially in a rising rate environment, so any bad news, including Mr Trump tweeting on Boeing, is going to have a big impact on the market," PSW Investments chief executive Phil Davis told Reuters.

Trump Tweet hits Boeing
Boeing shares dropped 1.4% to $US150.02 early in the session after US president-elect Donald Trump called on the government to cancel an order to build new Air Force One jets.

"Boeing is building a brand new 747 Air Force One for future presidents, but costs are out of control, more than $4 billion. Cancel order!" Mr Trump said on Twitter just before the market opened.

Asked by reporters, Mr Trump did not say why he believes the planes will cost "more than $US4 billion," CNN reported.

"The statistics that have been cited [by Trump], shall we say, don't appear to reflect the nature of the financial arrangement between Boeing and the Department of Defense," said Obama White House spokesman Josh Earnest, according to CNN.

The shares eventually closed up 8USc, or 0.14%, at $US152.46.

Oil prices retreat
US oil prices retreated following four consecutive sessions of gains. Crude had rallied after Opec members struck a long-sought agreement to reduce production last week but prices fell 1.7% to $US50.93 a barrel. 

"Reaction to the OPEC news was overdone," Phil Davis, managing partner at venture capital firm PSW Investments in Woodland Park, New Jersey, told Reuters. "All they did was agree to cut output they had added recently."

US government bond yields have been rising since Election Day. They climbed again, with the yield on the 10-year US Treasury note rising to 2.396% from 2.387% on Monday,

Stocks in Europe rally
In Europe, the Stoxx 600 Index finished the day with a 1% rally from the previous close, bolstered by bank and utility stocks.

The UK's FTSE 100 Index increased 0.5%, Germany's DAX Index rose 0.9%, while France's CAC 40 Index gained 1.3%.

Investors are awaiting the results of European Central Bank gathering on Thursday, with bets the central bank will extend its bond-buying programme.

Meanwhile, Italy's banks might be offered a helping hand following Sunday's referendum that prompted Prime Minister Matteo Renzi to resign.

"Optimism about banks is driving markets in Europe higher, on expectations that some sort of bail-in for Italian institutions is on the cards," London-based IG market analyst Chris Beauchamp wrote in a note, according to Bloomberg.

"This would provide a real boost to risk appetite."

(BusinessDesk)