At the close of the New York Stock Exchange, the Dow Jones rose 0.59%, the S&P 500 rose 0.48% and the NASDAQ Composite rose 0.01%.

UnitedHealth Group Incorporated was the top performer among the Dow Jones index components in today's trading, up 14.69 points or 2.85% to close at 530.00. Quotes of Cisco Systems Inc rose by 1.20 points (2.58%), closing the session at 47.79. Merck & Company Inc rose 1.92 points or 1.88% to close at 104.23.

The least gainers were Salesforce Inc, which shed 1.65 points or 1.10% to end the session at 148.04. Walgreens Boots Alliance Inc was up 0.95% or 0.38 points to close at 39.75 while Chevron Corp was down 0.60% or 1.10 points to close at 182. .99.

Among the S&P 500 index components gainers today were Ross Stores Inc, which rose 9.86% to hit 107.59, Gap Inc, which gained 7.55% to close at 13.67, and shares of Lincoln National Corporation, which rose 4.37% to close the session at 37.73.

The least gainers were Live Nation Entertainment Inc, which shed 7.85% to close at 66.21. Shares of Fortinet Inc lost 3.66% to end the session at 52.16. Diamondback Energy Inc lost 3.44% to 156.22.

Leading gainers among the components of the NASDAQ Composite in today's trading were AGBA Acquisition Ltd, which rose 50.67% to hit 6.78, Paxmedica Inc, which gained 37.42% to close at 2.13, and shares of Mercurity Fintech Holding Inc ADR, which rose by 32.91%, ending the session at around 1.05.

Shares of Kiora Pharmaceuticals Inc were the biggest losers, losing 35.85% to close at 3.83. Shares of Bit Origin Ltd lost 29.80% and ended the session at 0.15. Quotes of InMed Pharmaceuticals Inc decreased in price by 28.13% to 2.76.

On the New York Stock Exchange, the number of securities that rose in price (1884) exceeded the number of those that closed in the red (1211), while quotes of 138 shares remained virtually unchanged. On the NASDAQ stock exchange, 1985 companies rose in price, 1772 fell, and 237 remained at the level of the previous close.

The CBOE Volatility Index, which is based on S&P 500 options trading, fell 3.38% to 12/23.

Gold futures for December delivery lost 0.66%, or 11.65, to hit $1.00 a troy ounce. In other commodities, WTI crude for December delivery fell 1.73%, or 1.41, to $80.23 a barrel. Futures for Brent crude for January delivery fell 2.17%, or 1.95, to $87.83 a barrel.

Meanwhile, in the Forex market, the EUR/USD pair remained unchanged at 0.36% to 1.03, while USD/JPY rose 0.13% to hit 140.37.

Futures on the USD index rose 0.25% to 106.86.