US STOCKS-S&P 500 breaks through 3,000 following Powell comments

* Three main Wall Street indexes hit record highs
* Fed's Powell begins two-day testimony before Congress
* Technology biggest boost to indexes
* Stocks briefly extend gains after Fed minutes
* Indexes up: Dow 0.3%, S&P 0.5%, Nasdaq 0.6%

(Updates to after Fed minutes)
By Caroline Valetkevitch
NEW YORK, July 10 (Reuters) - The benchmark S&P 500 briefly
crossed the 3,000-point mark for the first time on Wednesday
after dovish remarks from Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell
boosted the case for an interest rate cut later this month.
The Nasdaq and the Dow also scaled all-time highs after
Powell, who gave semi-annual testimony on monetary policy before
the U.S. House of Representatives Financial Services Committee,
said the central bank stands ready to "act as appropriate" to
support record U.S. economic growth.
Stocks briefly added to gains following minutes from the
last meeting of Fed policymakers. The minutes from the June
18-19 meeting showed that many Fed officials thought more
stimulus would be needed soon if risks to the U.S. economy did
not let up. Amazon.com AMZN.O , Microsoft Corp MSFT.O and Apple Inc
AAPL.O were among the biggest boosts to the indexes.
Powell also pointed to economic risks, including
persistently weak inflation, slowing global growth and a
downturn in business investment. "The recent rally is speculation on the Fed lowering
interest rates to continue to perpetuate this amazing recovery
we've had. In Powell's testimony today, he referenced that quite
often - that the Fed's job is to perpetuate this recovery by
achieving full employment and controlling inflation, and they've
done both," said Tim Ghriskey, chief investment strategist at
Inverness Counsel in New York.
"I'd say that's what's dominated the market over the past
month or so."
The Dow Jones Industrial Average .DJI rose 90.75 points,
or 0.34%, to 26,874.24, the S&P 500 .SPX gained 13.3 points,
or 0.45%, to 2,992.93 and the Nasdaq Composite .IXIC added
51.65 points, or 0.63%, to 8,193.38.
The S&P 500 index of financial shares, which tend to benefit
in a higher interest rate environment, retreated 0.3% after
Powell's comments.
Advancing issues outnumbered declining ones on the NYSE by a
2.07-to-1 ratio; on Nasdaq, a 1.26-to-1 ratio favored advancers.
The S&P 500 posted 72 new 52-week highs and two new lows;
the Nasdaq Composite recorded 94 new highs and 37 new lows.