STORY: U.S. stocks closed mostly higher on Monday, thanks to a rally in chip stocks.
But the Dow ended marginally lower. The S&P 500 gained more than half a percent and the Nasdaq rose about one-and-a-quarter percent.
Chipmakers got a boost from Microsoft's plan to invest $80 billion to develop artificial-intelligence-enabled data centers. Shares of the tech giant rose 1%.
Foxconn's forecast-beating fourth-quarter revenue also helped lift the sector.
Stocks have had a mostly bumpy couple of weeks, but should continue to rise largely on the back of tech stocks, said Sam Stovall, chief investment strategist at CFRA Research.
"We've been seeing volatility as we have over the last several days. The markets started off on a very solid footing and then seemed to give back some of that. But tech continues to be in the lead because of a nice surprise by Foxconn and its fourth quarter revenues, which sort of triggered an advance by the other semiconductor stocks. So I think investors are starting the year very optimistically toward tech in general and semiconductors in particular."
Nvidia and Advanced Micro Devices both gained more than 3%, while Micron Technology jumped roughly ten-and-a-half percent.
Among other movers, shares of Ford and General Motors rose after a newspaper report said President-elect Donald Trump's incoming administration would impose tariffs only on certain sectors deemed critical to national or economic security. Trump later refuted the report.
And shares of Citigroup gained about two-and-a-half percent after receiving a bullish rating from Barclays. That followed positive comments from Wells Fargo last week.