Tuesday's Stock Market Open: US Equities Open Moderately Higher On Shortened Christmas Eve Trading

U.S. stocks climbed modestly higher on Tuesday in what is expected to be a slow Christmas Eve trading day. Equity markets close at 1 p.m. EST, with traders likely to add to Monday's gains, which were fueled by tariff cuts ordered by China.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average gained 22.68 points to 28,574.21 while the S&P 500 climbed 1.75 points to 3,225.76 and the Nasdaq Composite Index rose 8.65 points to 8,954.29.

“Markets officially entered [the] holiday as trading volumes remain very thin and as Wall Street prepares to take the rest of the week off,” Edward Moya, senior market analyst at Oanda, wrote in a Tuesday research note.

Julian Emanuel, managing director and chief equity and derivatives strategist at BTIG, said the stock market will surge next year – projecting a 22% gain for the S&P 500.

“We think confidence will ultimately translate into the public getting this enthusiasm for stocks which could cause [S&P 500] prices to move as high as 3,950,” he told CNBC on Monday. “In any great bull market, whether you think of technology in 2000 or houses over the course of the last couple of decades, it always … gets closer to the end when the public gets enthusiastic. We think this is the year.”

Overnight in Asia, markets finished mixed. The Hang Seng fell 0.15% while Japan’s Nikkei-225 edged up 0.04% and China’s Shanghai Composite rose 0.67%

In Europe the FTSE 100 rose 0.11% while France's CAC 40 was flat. Germany's DAX was closed Tuesday.

Crude oil futures rose 0.48% at $60.81 per barrel and Brent crude gained 0.4% at $65.82. Gold futures gained 0.42%.

The euro slipped 0.07% at $1.1081 while the pound sterling rose 0.12% at $1.2951.