US stocks rose in early trading on Thursday, with the S&P 500 at a fresh record intraday high following upbeat labour market data, while traders kept an eye on developments in Ukraine. In a boost to riskier assets, the euro hit its highest against the US dollar since late December after the European Central Bank kept interest rates on hold, shaking out bets of a cut in rates.
Crimea's parliament voted on Thursday to join Russia and its Moscow-backed government set a referendum for March 16 on the decision, in an escalation of the crisis between Russia and the West over the Ukrainian Black Sea peninsula. Moscow stocks lost more than 2 percent after the vote in Crimea but pared the losses and were down 1 percent. The ruble weakened 0.4 percent versus the US dollar. A US-traded Russian ETF fell 0.6 percent to $23.52. The Dow Jones industrial average rose 74.33 points or 0.45 percent, to 16,434.51, the S&P 500 gained 5.61 points or 0.3 percent, to 1,879.42 and the Nasdaq Composite added 6.026 points or 0.14 percent, to 4,364.
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