US STOCKS-S&P 500 inches closer to record high as stimulus bets climb

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* S&P on verge of reclaiming February highs
* Royal Caribbean eyes COVID-19 testing to help restart
cruises
* Indexes: Dow up 1.23%, S&P up 0.46%, Nasdaq off 0.44%

(Updates to open)
By Medha Singh and Ambar Warrick
Aug 11 (Reuters) - The S&P 500 on Tuesday closed in on its
February record high, returning to levels last seen before the
onset of the coronavirus crisis that caused one of Wall Street's
most dramatic crashes in history.
The benchmark index was about half a percent below its peak
hit on Feb. 19, when investors started dumping shares in
anticipation of what proved to be the biggest slump in the U.S.
economy since the Great Depression.
Ultra-low interest rates, trillions of dollars in stimulus
and, more recently, a better-than-feared second-quarter earnings
season have allowed all three of Wall Street's main indexes to
recover.
The tech-heavy Nasdaq .IXIC has led the charge, boosted by
"stay-at-home winners" Amazon.com Inc AMZN.O , Netflix Inc
NFLX.O and Apple Inc AAPL.O . The index was down about 0.4%
in early trading.
The blue-chip Dow .DJI surged 1.2%, coming within 5% of
its February peak.
"You've got to admit that this is a market that wants to go
up, despite tensions between U.S.-China, despite news of the
coronavirus not being particularly encouraging," said Andrea
Cicione, a strategist at TS Lombard.
"We're facing an emergency from the health, economy and
employment point of view — the outlook is a lot less rosy.
There's a disconnect between valuation and the actual outlook
even though lower rates to some degree justify high valuation."
Aiding sentiment, President Vladimir Putin claimed Russia
had become the first country in the world to grant regulatory
approval to a COVID-19 vaccine. But the approval's speed has
concerned some experts as the vaccine still must complete final
trials. Investors are now hoping Republicans and Democrats will
resolve their differences and agree on another relief program to
support about 30 million unemployed Americans, as the battle
with the virus outbreak was far from over with U.S. cases
surpassing 5 million last week. Also in focus are Sino-U.S. tensions ahead of high-stakes
trade talks in the coming weekend.
"Certainly the rhetoric from Washington has been negative
with regards to China ... there's plenty of things to worry
about, but markets are really focused more on the very easy
fiscal and monetary policies at this point," said Paul Nolte,
portfolio manager at Kingsview Asset Management in Chicago.
Financials .SPSY , energy .SPNY and industrial .SPLRCI
sectors, that have lagged the benchmark index this year,
provided the biggest boost to the S&P 500 on Tuesday.
The S&P 500 was set to rise for the eighth straight session,
its longest streak of gains since April 2019.
At 9:44 a.m. ET, the S&P 500 .SPX was up 15.39 points, or
0.46%, at 3,375.86, about 18 points shy of its high of 3,393.52.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average .DJI was up 341.41 points, or
1.23%, at 28,132.85, and the Nasdaq Composite .IXIC was down
48.37 points, or 0.44%, at 10,919.99.
Royal Caribbean Group RCL.N jumped 4.6% after it hinted at
new safety measures aimed at getting sailing going again after
months of cancellations. Peers Norwegian Cruise Line Holdings
Ltd NCLH.N and Carnival Corp CCL.N also rose.
No. 1 U.S. mall owner Simon Property Group Inc SPG.N
gained 4.1% despite posting a disappointing second-quarter
profit, as its chief executive officer expressed some hope over
a recovery in retail as lockdown measures in some regions eased.
Advancing issues outnumbered decliners 3.44-to-1 on the NYSE
and 1.44-to-1 on the Nasdaq.
The S&P index recorded 35 new 52-week highs and no new low,
while the Nasdaq recorded 50 new highs and four new lows.