Since the start of 2024, the S&P 500 has never once closed below its 200-day moving average, according to Bespoke Investment Group. Barring a sharp selloff between now and the end of the year, this would be only the 12th time since 1952 that this has happened.

Some of the biggest winners were mega-cap tech stocks, with Tesla up by 6% while Broadcom, Netflix, and Amazon each gained about 2%.

US stocks looked set for a mostly muted open to a final, shortened trading session before the Christmas holiday,

The Dow Jones Industrial Average went up 66.69 points or 0.2% to end at 42,906.95 for its third straight daily gain, according to Dow Jones Market Data. The S&P 500 went up 43.22 points or 0.7% to finish at 5,974.07.

Stocks are broadly higher in trading on Wall Street, led by gains in Big Tech stocks. The S&P 500 was up 0.7% Tuesday.

Tuesday’s U.S. market “Santa rally” comes as the stock market enters what’s historically been a very cheerful season. The last five trading days of each year, plus the first two in the new year, have brought an average gain of 1.3% since 1950.

Markets closed early and volume was thin, but all three main equity benchmarks closed higher on Tuesday to mark the official start of the Santa Claus Rally. Indeed, the tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite and the broad-based S&P 500 had their best Christmas Eve showings since 2000 and 2011,