While you were sleeping: UPDATED Record Dow high just falls short of 20,000

Wall Street climbed to fresh records amid the momentum of optimistic sentiment about the outlook for US economic growth and corporate profits.

At the close, the Dow Jones Industrial Average was up 91.56 points, 0.5%, to 19,974.62 after touching a record-high 19,987.63 and just shy of the 20,000 milestone.

The Nasdaq Composite Index also hit a record 5489.47 before closing 0.5% hiogher at 5483.94. The Standard & Poor's 500 Index added 0.4% to 2270.76.

In the Dow, advances in Caterpillar and Nike shares, trading 1.7% and 1.4% higher respectively, outweighed slides in Merck and Cisco shares, down 0.9% and 0.5% respectively.

Wall Street has steadily climbed since the election victory of Donald Trump prompted bets that the US president-elect will boost spending and ease regulation.

The Dow is now up 15% so far this year, while the S&P 500 has risen 11% and the Nasdaq Composite is up 9.5%.

"It's just the momentum since the election," Florida-based US Bank managing director Jeff Zipper told Reuters.

"The market is focused on the Trump agenda, which is tax cuts, infrastructure spending and deregulation. There's not a lot of selling going on."

Boost for Nvidia
Shares of Nvidia rallied, up 3.8% at 1.02pm in New York, after brokerages Goldman Sachs and Mizuho lifted their price targets on the stock, according to media reports.

"We continue to view [Nvidia] as a unique growth story in semis, levered to positive secular trends in gaming, VR [virtual reality], AI [artificial intelligence]/ML [machine learning] and automotive," analyst Toshiya Hari wrote in a note to clients, CNBC reported.

Meanwhile, General Mills shares dropped 3.3% after the maker of Cheerio breakfast cereal and Yoplait yoghurt posted weaker than expected profit and sales in its second quarter.

The Minneapolis-based company says it now expects organic net sales, which exclude acquisitions and divestitures, to drop between 3-4% in its fiscal 2017, downgraded from the previous estimate for "flat" to down 2%.

"Although we posted disappointing net sales performance in the second quarter, we delivered good growth in adjusted diluted EPS, driven by significant expansion in our adjusted operating profit margin," General Mills chief executive Officer Ken Powell says.

"Our organic sales declines reflect the actions we've taken to optimise our spending and prioritise profitable volume, as well as weakening food-industry trends in the US."

The yield on the 10-year US Treasury note rose to 2.566%, up from 2.544% on Monday.

In Europe, the Stoxx 600 Index finished the day with a 0.5% increase from the previous close. Germany's DAX Index rose 0.3%, the UK's FTSE 100 Index gained 0.4%, while France's CAC 40 Index climbed 0.6%.

(BusinessDesk)