NEW YORK, June 10 — Wall Street stocks rose early today, pushing the S&P 500 into record territory, as the market evinced little worry over data showing higher US inflation.

The US inflation rate accelerated to five per cent for the 12 months ending May as energy and used car prices rose, government data showed.

The rise topped expectations, but the sequential increase of 0.6 per cent from April to May was lower than the 0.8 per cent month-to-month rise from March to April, said Art Hogan, chief market strategist at National Securities.

That dynamic largely validates the Federal Reserve’s stance that higher inflation will be transitory, he said.

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“We may be getting close to a peak and it will start to decelerate in the June, July timeframe,” Hogan said.

About 25 minutes into trading, the Dow Jones Industrial Average was at 34,692.34, up 0.7 per cent.

The broad-based S&P 500 also climbed 0.7 per cent to 4,247.57, putting it above its all-time closing high, while the tech-rich Nasdaq Composite Index jumped 0.8 per cent to 14,018.17.

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The reopening US economy pushed weekly filings for jobless benefits to a new pandemic low of 376,000 new claims, the Labor Department said, although the number was a bit above analyst expectations.

Elsewhere, the European Central Bank, as expected, kept its vast pandemic-era stimulus in place.

ECB chief Christine Lagarde warned that it was “premature” to start tightening monetary policy, saying continued support was needed to reduce economic uncertainty despite a brighter outlook. — AFP