US stocks rise on reports of big Micron bid

New York - Wall Street stocks rose on Tuesday, with the Nasdaq leading the way following reports of a possible $23bn acquisition of chipmaker Micron and big gains by Google and others.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average climbed 75.90 points (0.42%) to 18 053.58.

The broad-based S&P 500 advanced 9.35 (0.45%) to 2 108.95, while the tech-rich Nasdaq Composite Index jumped 33.38 (0.66%) to 5 104.89.

Micron Technology surged 11.4% following reports that Tsinghua Unigroup, an investment arm of one of China's leading science and technology universities, plans to offer $23bn for the company.

Other chipmakers rose, including SanDisk (+3.4%), STMicroelectronics (+1.2%) and Texas Instruments (+0.9%).

Google climbed 2.7% following a Wall Street Journal report that said the company was curbing hiring and taking a tougher approach to spending under new chief financial officer Ruth Porat. The tech giant will report earnings after the market close on Thursday.

Online retailer Amazon advanced 2.2% following an upgrade by UBS.

Several Nasdaq-listed biotech companies also notched large gains, including Gilead Sciences (+2.5%) and Amgen and Biogen (both +2.3%).

Twitter finished 2.6% higher after spiking more than five percent following a bogus news report about a possible $31bn takeover of the micro blogging company. The story appeared on a website falsely claiming to be run by Bloomberg, but was quickly denied by the news agency.

Banking giant and Dow member JPMorgan Chase climbed 1.4% after second-quarter earnings rose 5.2% to $6.3bn. Wells Fargo advanced 0.9% on flat earnings of $5.7bn.

Johnson & Johnson, another Dow component, fell 0.5% as second-quarter sales dropped 8.8% to $17.78bn, due in large part to the effects of the strong dollar.

Discount carrier Spirit Airlines shed 7.4% after estimating that second-quarter results would be hit by $20m in costs from cancelling about 500 US flights due to bad weather. Spirit also lowered its full-year forecast due to stronger price competition.

Bond prices rose. The yield on the 10-year US Treasury dipped to 2.40% from 2.44% on Monday, while the 30-year dropped to 3.20% from 3.22%. Bond prices and yields move inversely.