Boston Herald The Ticker column

April 18–Stocks post biggest gain in six weeks

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Stocks closed broadly higher on Wall Street, giving the market its biggest gain in six weeks.

Banks posted big gains yesterday. Wells Fargo jumped 2.7 percent. Among consumer-focused stocks, Amazon.com gained 2 percent. Medical device maker Alere soared 16 percent after it agreed to new terms on a sale to Abbott Laboratories.

The Standard & Poor's 500 index gained 20.06 points, or 0.9 percent, to 2,349.01. The Dow Jones industrial average rose 183.67 points, or 0.9 percent, to 20,636.92. The Nasdaq composite increased 51.64 points, or 0.9 percent, to 5,856.79.

Netflix is nearing 100M subscribers

SAN FRANCISCO — Netflix is on the verge of surpassing 100 million subscribers, a testament to how much video streaming has changed the entertainment landscape in the past decade.

The video service added nearly 5 million subscribers during the first three months of the year to end March with 98.7 million customers in about 190 countries. HBO still leads Netflix with 134 million subscribers worldwide.

Trump to sign bill for veterans' care

WASHINGTON — President Trump plans to sign legislation tomorrow to extend a program that gives veterans access to private-sector health care.

The extension will provide stopgap services as Veterans Affairs Secretary David Shulkin develops a longer-term plan to allow veterans to more easily go outside the VA medical system for care. The program would expire in August without the legislation. It was developed after a 2014 scandal over wait times at the VA medical center in Phoenix. Some veterans died.

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