From the new york stock exchange, the blue chip dow and s p both closed at records today with no Major Economic reports, the optimism seems to have come from the Technology Sector which is the best performing group this year. Even after that wobbly performance we saw last week. Here are the closing numbers for this monday. The dow industrial average advanced by 144 point to close at 21,528. The nasdaq was up 87. Thats a 1. 5 gain. The s p 500 added 20 points today. Contessa . If youre a longterm investor, youre probably not complaining act the markets performance so far this year. With history as a guide, mike s santoli takes a look at what might happen in the months ahead. Reporter not quite halfway through 2017, the stock market has already returned nearly 10 . Equal to the longterm average gains for a full year. It would be a mistake to assume this means stocks are way ahead of themselves or due to stall for the next several months. It turns out the stock market only rarely produces an average return in a given calendar year. Since 1928, only 6 years saw the s p 500 index gain between 5 and 10 . What weve come to think of as the longterm average yearly performance. Indexes declined more than 20 in a year, four times as often, in fact, and experienced outright declines 30 times in those 89 years. This is a good reminder that equity markets deliver their rewards in waves, not in metered doses. So if the market is unlikely to simply idle near this level for the next six months where might is go based on historical conditions and patterns . No one can say with much certainty, the weight of the evidence tilts toward the upside. The ongoing recovery in corporate profits and economic growth, the behavior of the market, itself, this year, a calm persistent uptrend, most closely resembles past years that finished strong. Whenever the s p has been up at least 7. 5 in the years first 100 days as it was this year, stocks added to those gains through year end 20 out of 23 times. And since 1950, if there have been at least 15 alltime highs through may just like this year, the index added on average another gain of nearly 8 through december which is significantly better than in the average year. One looming negative exception to these encouraging patterns is 1987. A scary year to come up in historical comparisons given the crash that october. Yet its important to note that stocks had soared a whopping 40 from january into august that year, a far more overheated market than the current one so far. None of these historical patterns make the market to immune to shots from a sharp growth slowdown, aggressive series of Federal Reserve rate hikes or a political crisis, but they do serve as comforting context for a stock market that has surprised many this year with its quiet relentless strength. For nightly Business Report, im mike santoli. Jack ablin joins us now to talk more about the market and if the gains weve seen so far this year can continue in the months ahead. Good to see you, jack. Thanks, bill. Thank you. By many measures, this market is overvalued. You agree with that. Whats powering it and can this continue, do you think . Yeah, i think its a combination of certainly improving earnings. Theres no question about it. But youre right, relative to those earnings, revenue to revenues, the market is still at pretty stretched levels. So what it is, i believe, is liquidity, its that ageold drip thats been going on now since the financial crisis. In fact, over the last 12 months, Central Banks collectively have added more than 2 trillion to the financial system. I think thats emboldened investors and allowed them to take on maybe more risk than they would normally like to see when values are like, you know, where they are today. And jack, what we saw today in the markets is much of the rally being driven by tech here. Is the worst over, and if so, does that worry you that youre seeing a correction of maybe 3 and upward movement . Lets get on with it and keep growing and adding money into the tech sector . Well, i think, contessa, i think the tech move that we had this year caught a lot of people fl flatfooted so when they saw the downdraft toward the end of last week, i think most people looked at it more as an opportunity than a threat. You know, it remains to be seen how that plays out, certainly. Tech is relatively expensive, although if you look at it, you know, in relative to its own history and relative to the market, its not a stretch as it was, say, the tech bubble in 19992000. Our viewers may be wondering, gee, is this the time to be getting in if im not already there or should i be committing new money . Jack vogel often says its always a good time to invest. Especially if youre dollar cost averaging. What does jack ablin say about this market right now . Im not going to repute the notable jack on this one, but, you know, a lot of it also depends on your timeframe. Remember, dont touch stocks unless you have at least seven to ten years to let it percolate in a portfolio and let it grow over time. I think if you build a portfolio right, you should never have to sell anything at a loss. What that really means is, youve got to time your needs, your, you know, drawing against your portfolio, against the assets that youre holding. If you need something tomorrow, dont put it in the stock market, put it in a money market fund. If you can hold for seven to ten years, certainly a longterm investing making a lot of sense. Jack ablin with bemo private bank. Always good to see you, jack. Thank you. Thanks, bill. The Supreme Court tightened rules on where injury lawsuits can be filed. The decision is considered a win for businesses that want to prevent plaintiffs from shopping around for friendly courts. The justices overturned a Lower Court Ruling that allowed hundreds of out of state patients to sue Bristolmyers Squibb in california over prescription drugs. And in a separate case, the Supreme Court ruled the trademarks that are seen as disparaging are protected under the 1st amendment. That case which involved an asianamerican musician could have implications for similar disputes including for the Washington Redskins which had its trademark revoked under the same statute that the justices invalidated today. Also in washington, executives from some highprofile technology companies, including microsoft, intel and mastercard, arrived at the white house for the first meeting of the American Technology council. They met with president ial adviser Jared Kushner and focused in part on modernizing the government. Together, we will unleash the creativity of the private sector to provide Citizen Services in a way that has never happened before. We will foster a new set of startups focused on gov tech and be a Global Leader in the field making government more transparent and responsive to citizens needs. Eamon javerss is following the story for us. Eamon, they were talking about 6,000 data centers for the government here, 86 billion that the government spends on technology. So what else is there to talk about in a Big Technology summit like this . Reporter well, contessa, the one stat that got my attention today was they said the department of defense is still using those old eight inch floppy disks we all remember from the distant past. Thats still in the government i. T. Procurement system. Theyre saying they want to take ideas from private sector executives and use them to modernize the way the government does business. Theyre trying to get best practices from the glittering lights of silicon valley. Weve got tim co the idea is theyre going to simply pick their brains here for some good ideas. Wait, not everybody uses floppy disks anymore . Reporter the is that old . Reporter we know ill put the phone down for a second. I want to ask you about the ceos. Jeff bezos of amazon, tim cook of apple were there. Any notable absences . Reporter Mark Zuckerberg from facebook was invited to come today, im told declined saying he had a scheduling conflict. Im also told the white house was sort of only interested here in ceolevel executives, thats why theres nobody else here from facebook. But that is a big person whos missing from the picture here today. Obviously zuckerberg has been on his own sort of politicallike tour of the country out there meeting with americans of every demographic in every state. You wonder whether he has political ambitions or whether it really was a scheduling conflict here at the white house. I know a lot of the ceos are sort of walking a fine line between trying to satisfy customers who may not like what the white house has to say and also trying to have the ear of the president to effect change. Eamon, thank you for covering that in such great detail. Reporter you bet. Meanwhile the president of the Federal Reserve bank of new york has confidence in the economy. Bill dudley said today inflation should rise alongside wages allowing the central bank to continue to gradually tighten interest rates. Influn shl policd the economy is in a good place right now. Americans are feeling good about the economy, the conclusion of cnbcs latest all america survey, certain key components hitting alltime highs. Steve liesman takes a closer look at those results. Reporter Economic Optimism in the United States remains strong, as the postelection bump continues and even looks to be strengthening. The percentage of americans optimistic about the Current Situation and optimistic about the future remains at a record 30 . Spurred on by surging republican optimism and democratic pessimism that remains below republican levels during the obama years. On the stock market, we have three straight tracks in a row dating back to when just right after trump was elected where people are saying its a better its a good time to invest in the stock market even as weve seen record high Dow Jones Industrial averages and record high stock prices in many sectors, so those are really important, positive indicators that people are feeling good about the economy. Reporter the cnbc all America Economic survey shows the percentage of americans who think their home prices will rise in the next year is at a record and the percentage to see higher wages in the coming year is at a near record. Its not necessarily good news for the president. Fewer americans who have positive outlooks say its because of President Trump and more americans who have negative attitudes, they pin it on the president. That as the survey shows a disconnect between optimistic views on the economy and views of President Trump. President trumps base is starting to erode from lihim, hs had a drop of ten points in approval from republicans. Hes now under 80 approval among republicans. Even those who say that they cast a vote for him in november, theyve dropped off in their support as well. When youre left in that position, when your base starts to move away from you, it becomes very difficult to pass an agenda and to govern. Reporter the president s Approval Rating has fallen to 37 . Down from 39 in april. And while President Trumps approval on the economy is a bit better at 41 , those numbers are also down from the prior poll. For nightly Business Report, im steve liesman. Still ahead, the Aerospace Industry takes flight. The global dema fly which is reason orders for new airplanes are pouring in here at the Paris Air Show. Im phil lebeau. Well go behind the scenes coming up on the nightly Business Report. For defense and commercial aviation companies, 2017 is turning into one of the strongest years ever. Demand for military jets and commercial airplanes is climbing and that makes this years Paris Air Show a very busy place for some of the Worlds Largest companies. Phil lebeau, as you saw, has more from us from paris. Reporter with lockheed martins f35 putting on a show in the sky, Defense Companies are taking center stage at the Paris Air Show. We are absolutely busier, we have looked at what our meetings are and they are up by a large significant magnitude and we expect to have great interactions all day today and throughout the week. Reporter military contractors are gearing up for more orders as countries expand their Defense Budgets including the u. S. , where the Trump Administration is pushing for a 10 increase. I suspect theyll be in negotiation. We think we can see sustained low to mid single digit growth in the defense budget. Reporter for commercial airplane makers, the focus is on clearing out backlogs that now stretch well past 2020 which is why commercial orders at this years show are not as robust as in recent years. Were at maximum production, alltime maximum production. Its not doom and gloom. Its just flat which is not a bad thing. Reporter the fact is, the number of people around the world who are flying continues to climb and should for the foreseeable future. We just updated our current market outlook. We over the next 20 years see a need for about 41,000 new airplanes. Were continuing to see lift there. Reporter boeings optimism about surging Global Demand for travel is one reason why the company is exploring building a hypersonic commercial airplane that would let people fly anywhere in the world within two hours. Thats right. Two hours of flying at speeds of up to five times the speed of sound. Phil lebeau, nightly Business Report, france. Wow eqt bids to be the nations largest natural gas producer, and thats where we begin tonights market focus. Oil and gas company said it would pay nearly 7 billion for rival rice energy. Eqt also said it will have the ability to drill longer horizontal wells as most of rices Energy Assets are located right next to land owned by eqt. Now, eqt shares fell about 9 to 53. 51. Rice Energy Shares surged nearly 25 to 24. 57. Financial Services Firm wedbush speculated that amazons deal with whole foods makes food delivery service, grubhub, amazons next logical takeover target. Said the ecommerce giant could benefit from grubhubs Geographic Presence and its delivery infrastructure. It also noted a potential deal could grow amazons user base as grubhub and whole foods are found in some of the same markets. Shares rose more than 4 to 45. 34. And lab products maker perkin elmer will buy german based Laboratory Diagnostics for more than 1 billion. The merger will expand its reach into the autoimmune and allergy diagnostic markets and provide new Infectious Disease tests to its customers in china. Perkin elmer shares raised 6. 5 . Valiant pharmaceuticals elected billionaire investor john paulson to its board of directors. The embattled drug company which is working toward reducing its debt said paulsons experience will help the company complete its turnaround strategy. To date, paulsons hedge fund lost nearly 2 billion on its investments in vilaliant. They made money today, valiant shares were up 6 , close at 14. Clovis said its study has met its goals in the latestage study. It had a meaningful impact on delaying disease reoccurrence in patients who had an advanced form of ovarian cancer. Clovis said it plans to it apply for Regulatory Approval within the next four months. Shares soared as you can imagine. They were up by 46plus percent to 87. 88. Chinas stock markets are some of the worlds biggest but it hasnt always been easy for investors to gain access. That could change tomorrow if a major Index Provider decides to include shares of some Chinese Companies. Bob pisani describes why Global Investors are paying close attention. Reporter this is a big deal because indexes like msci rule the world since they determine what goes into all these etfs that were buying. Right now, only Hong Konglisted stocks are included in the indexes. There are no Mainland China stocks in it right now. Mainland chinas stock market is worth 6 trillion. Thats the same essentially as the hong kong stock market. 6 trillion is almost onetenth of the total stock market capitalization in the world and its not in those indexe key issues with Mainland China stocks, a couple of them, first, its too easy for companies to hold trading in their stocks. Chinese regulators now instituted new rules that limit under what circumstances and for how long Chinese Companies can both trade. Theres been another issue. Limits on how much that could be taken in and out of the market at any one time. But the creation of direct stock links between shanghai and hong kong and shenzhen and hong kong, the two big exchanges in Mainland China, now make it far easier to get money into and out of the mainland stock market. All right. What does all this mean for investors . It means if you own International Indexes through exchangex chan changetraded funds, for exampl the chances are youll be owns much more china stocks if this goes through. It will