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Published 02 Jun, 2020 01:17pm

Wall St. set for higher open on prospects of economic recovery

(Reuters) - Wall Street’s main indexes were set to hit fresh three-month highs on Tuesday as optimism over reopening businesses overshadowed fears of more disruptions from protests in the country over the death of a black man while in police custody.

Some of the worst-hit stocks in the travel sector, including American Airlines Group Inc (AAL.O), United Airlines (UAL.O), Norwegian Cruise Line (NCLH.N) and Carnival Corp (CCL.N), rose between 1.3% and 2.9% in premarket trading.

Improving economic data, trillions of dollars in stimulus and a restart of business have helped the S&P 500 .SPX climb about 38% from its March lows, leaving it only about 11% below its Feb. 19 record high.

Investors, however, are keeping a close eye on Sino-U.S. tensions and anti-police brutality marches and rallies that have often turned violent in many cities.

Demonstrators set fire to a strip mall in Los Angeles, looted stores in New York City and at least five U.S. police officers were hit by gunfire, hours after President Donald Trump vowed to deploy the U.S. military to regain control of the streets.

“The reopening of the country and getting back to business is a much larger input into the equation versus what it is seen primarily as a temporary shutdown of sporadic businesses in the major cities that the demonstrations are actually causing the most damage,” said Art Hogan, chief market strategist at National Securities in New York.

“It is an emotionally charged issue which is less economically apparent.”

At 8:13 a.m. ET, Dow e-minis 1YMcv1 were up 121 points, or 0.48%. S&P 500 e-minis EScv1 were up 11.75 points, or 0.38% and Nasdaq 100 e-minis NQcv1 were up 27.25 points, or 0.28%.

Shares of Western Union (WU.N) jumped 10.3% after a report the money transfer company has made an offer to buy its smaller rival MoneyGram International Inc (MGI.O).

MoneyGram shares soared 51.4%.

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