Wall Street stocks rose on Monday, building on a strong rally from last week, while the United States has extended the period under which coronavirus control measures are in place.

The blue-chip index Dow Jones Industrial Average rose by 690 points, or 3.2%, to 22,327.48 points. The broader S&P 500 climbed 3.4% and the technology Nasdaq Composite ended the day with growth of 3.6%.

The CBOE Volatility Index, which measures the implied volatility of S&P 500 options, was down 12.91% to 57.08.

On Sunday, President Donald Trump announced that the state guidelines for social distance will be applied for a longer period – until April 30. The head of state added that the peak of deaths from coronavirus in the US is likely to be reached within two weeks. These measures, which can cause severe economic turmoil in the short term, have been viewed by some investors as preventing longer-term damage to the economy.

Meanwhile, Italy announced the lowest number of new cases of Covid-19 in two weeks.

Last week, Dow Jones recorded its largest weekly increase since 1938, jumping more than 12%. The S&P 500 and Nasdaq Composite had their best week since 2009, rising 10.3% and 9.1% respectively. The big gains last week were partly driven by expectations of big fiscal and monetary stimulus.

According to Johns Hopkins University, more than 713,000 cases of coronavirus have been confirmed worldwide. Recently, the United States became the country with the highest number of cases – over 136,000. Nearly half of all US cases are registered in New York, where there are over 59,000 people with Covid-19.

Corporate stocks performance

Rising stocks outnumbered declining ones on the New York Stock Exchange by 1,713 to 1,172 and 41 ended unchanged; on the Nasdaq Stock Exchange, 1,648 rose and 1,034 declined, while 56 ended unchanged.

Technology companies such as Microsoft, Alphabet and Amazon have led Wall Street’s growth. Microsoft stocks went up by 7%, while Alphabet and Amazon, added 3.3% and 3.4%, respectively.

Optimism on the markets has grown since Johnson & Johnson said it had discovered a potential coronavirus vaccine. The company stressed that human testing will begin in September. The company’s shares rose by 7.6%.

The positive impetus supported also Merck & Company Inc, which added 7.28%.

However, the stocks of Boeing Co fell by 6.00%.

The top performers on the S&P 500 were Universal Health Services Inc (+12.52%), Cigna Corp (+10.52%) and Autodesk Inc (+10.13%), while on the flipside were Apache Corporation (-15.43%), Coty Inc (-14.26%) and Royal Caribbean Cruises Ltd (-13.71%).