The new Wall Street record comes after a few attempts at the 20,000 barrier. Dominic Rushe writes:

The Dow Jones industrial average finally broke through the 20,000 barrier on Wednesday morning – a historic high for the leading stock market index and one it has been close to breaching since Christmas.

The Dow, which first nearly topped 20,000 on 13 December and again on 6 January, when it came within 0.37 points of the landmark, finally broke through after the opening bell was rung on Wall Street by Ashton Poole, CEO of lender Triangle Capital. The closing bell will be rung by executives from InBev, brewers of Stella Artois but whether the Dow’s rise will go flat by then remains to be seen.

The market had rallied sharply in the wake of Donald Trump’s presidential victory but seemed to loose steam ahead of his first day in office. It broke the barrier of Wednesday after infrastructure stocks rose sharply ahead of the market’s open, boosted by Trump’s renewed pledge to build a wall along the Mexican border and talks of massive infrastructure investment. The Dow record comes as the S&P 500 index, tech-heavy Nasdaq and London’s FTSE 100 stock market index have all hit record highs.