Wall Street starts the day on a strong note, S&P 500 up 1.4%

• Financials lead the gains in the early NA session.
• All 11 major sectors are in the positive territory.

Boosted by the upbeat tone surrounding the global equity indexes, Wall Street opened the day sharply higher and now looks to extend its upside move on the first day of the week.

Easing concerns over the impact of the Italian budget crisis amid falling Italian T-bond yields and narrowing spread with German government bond yields support the financial sector on Monday. As of writing, the S&P 500 Financials Index was up 2.17% on a daily basis while the financial-heavy Dow Jones Industrial Average was adding a little over 1% at 24,948 points.

Despite the upbeat market mood, however, the energy sector  struggles to make a decisive recovery with crude oil prices failing to stay in the positive territory. As the WTI is losing 60 cents on the day around $67, the  S&P 500 Energy Index is up only 0.45%, the smallest percentage gains out of the 11 major sectors.

Earlier in the day, the data from the United States showed that the core PCE price index stayed unchanged at 2% on a yearly basis to match the market expectation and confirm another 25 bps rate hike in December.

At the moment, the S&P 500 is up 1.4% on the day at 2,695.40 points and the Nasdaq Composite is adding  68.3 points, or 1%, at 6,921.63 points.