Apple's rally helps pull Wall Street near its record

Apple led the way and rose 4.3% amid optimism about demand for its latest iPhone design. It was the strongest force lifting the S&P 500 and on track to set its own record.

Cleveland-Cliffs jumped 19% after the steel company’s CEO, Lourenco Goncalves, said it would provide details soon about a potential deal with a major global steel producer that could mean bigger profits. He also said his company has potentially found signs of rare earths at sites in Michigan and Minnesota.

Such materials have grabbed the global spotlight after China recently put curbs on the export of its own rare earths, a move that President Donald Trump characterized as hostile. Trump’s ensuing threat of higher tariffs triggered big swings for Wall Street, but the concerns eased a bit after Trump said such high tax rates on Chinese imports are unsustainable.

Another source of worry for Wall Street, from the banking industry, also appears to be easing. Stocks of smaller and midsized banks climbed Monday, recovering some of their losses after a couple raised alarm bells last week by warning about potentially bad loans they’ve made.

Zions Bancorp. gained 4.3% Monday following its 5.1% drop last week. It will report its latest quarterly earnings after trading ends for the day, and scrutiny will be high after it said it’s charging off $50 million of loans where it found “apparent misrepresentations and contractual defaults” by the borrowers.

Amazon’s stock held up despite a widespread outage for its cloud computing service that caused disruption for internet users around the world early Monday. Amazon’s stock rose 1.5%.

This upcoming week will feature several big names reporting their latest quarterly results, including Coca-Cola on Tuesday, Tesla on Wednesday and Procter & Gamble on Friday.

The pressure is on companies broadly to show that their profits are growing. That would help justify the big gains their stock prices have made, including a torrid 35% run for the S&P 500 from a low in April.

Delivering bigger profits is one of the easiest ways for companies to quiet criticism that stock prices have gone too high. The other is for stock prices to fall.

Corporate profit reports have also taken on more importance because they offer windows into the strength of the U.S. economy when the U.S. government’s shutdown has delayed important economic updates.

That’s making the job of the Federal Reserve more difficult, as it tries to decide whether high inflation or the slowing job market is the bigger issue for the economy. Fed officials have indicated they’re likely to cut rates several more times in order to give the economy a boost. But that could be a mistake if inflation worsens, because low interest rates can push it even higher.

On Friday, the U.S. government will issue an update for inflation during September. The report was supposed to arrive earlier in month, and the Social Security Administration needs the numbers to calculate cost-of-living adjustments for beneficiaries. But the government said, “No other releases will be rescheduled or produced until the resumption of regular government services.”

In the bond market, Treasury yields held relatively steady. The yield on the 10-year Treasury eased to 3.98% from 4.02% late Friday.

In stock markets abroad, indexes rose across much of Europe and Asia.

Japan’s Nikkei 225 jumped 3.4%, after its governing Liberal Democrats found a new coalition partner, securing support for its leader Sanae Takaichi to become the country’s first female prime minister. Investors expect Takaichi to push for low interest rates, higher government spending and other policies that could help the market.

Indexes rose 2.4% in Hong Kong and 0.6% in Shanghai after China reported its economy grew at a 4.8% annual pace in the last quarter, supported by relatively strong exports as companies increased shipments markets other than the U.S.

Still, it was the slowest pace in a year. The world’s second-largest economy is still struggling to emerge from a prolonged downturn in its property market and to encourage consumers and businesses to spend more.

AP Business Writers David McHugh and Elaine Kurtenbach contributed.