MW These surging stocks just saved the 'Santa Claus rally.' Here's what turned things around.

By Isabel Wang

Dow ends at a fresh record and briefly crosses the 49,000 threshold for the first time in history

These stocks just rescued the "Santa Claus rally" following the U.S. raid in Venezuela.

U.S. stocks staged a dramatic rebound to kick off the first full trading week of the new year, just in time to rescue the so-called Santa Claus rally from going missing for another year.

The surprise heroes? A handful of energy, financials and consumer stocks, lifted by a U.S. military operation over the weekend that captured Venezuela's President Nicolás Maduro and gave Wall Street a welcome boost.

This year's Santa rally period - which covers the final five trading sessions of one year and the first two sessions of the next - officially ended after the closing bell on Monday. The historically strong period saw the S&P 500 SPX fall by a modest 0.1% after Dec. 24, while the Dow Jones Industrial Average DJIA advanced 1.1% and the Nasdaq COMP was down 0.7%, according to FactSet data (see chart).

SOURCE: DOW JONES MARKET DATA

It may have been a narrow win, with just one of the three major indexes eking out a gain, but the Santa rally still goes into the books as a success.

The blue-chip Dow on Monday also hit an intraday record and briefly crossed the 49,000 threshold for the first time in history, according to Dow Jones Market Data.

"Santa's rally might have come a bit late, but Wall Street has made strong gains as the first full week of the new year gets underway, with the Dow hitting an intraday record," said Danni Hewson, head of financial analysis at AJ Bell.

The Dow on Monday rose 1.2% to register a new record closing high of 48,977. The S&P 500 finished up by 0.6% and the Nasdaq advanced 0.7%, according to FactSet data.

The Santa rally had struggled to gain traction for most of the seven-trading-day period, only to be rescued by a burst of strong gains on the stock market on Monday, when a handful of stocks that appeared to benefit from the U.S. military operation in Venezuela helped propel the broader market higher.

Energy stocks rally

Leading that surge were energy stocks, with the S&P 500's energy sector XX:SP500.10 up 2.7% on expectations that some of America's biggest oil refiners could benefit from rebuilding Venezuela's oil infrastructure under U.S. oversight.

Shares of Chevron Corp. $(CVX)$ were up 5.1%, as the company already has a long-standing presence in Venezuela, while shares of Exxon Mobil Corp. (XOM) rose 2.2%. Oilfield-services companies such as SLB Ltd. $(SLB)$ and Halliburton Co. $(HAL)$ also saw their shares jump by around 8% on Monday, according to FactSet data.

"Rebuilding the oil industry in Venezuela will take considerable effort and investment, but with the U.S. currently in charge of the country and the path forward for whoever takes over after a 'safe and judicious' transition likely to be heavily tied to American interests, investors are eyeing opportunities," Hewson told MarketWatch in emailed commentary on Monday.

The market strength on Monday also broadened beyond the energy names in the stock market. The S&P 500's financials XX:SP500.40 and consumer discretionary sectors XX:SP500.25 were also among the top performers on the large-cap benchmark index on Monday, up 2.2% and 1.9%, respectively, according to FactSet data.

JPMorgan Chase & Co. $(JPM)$, the largest U.S. lender by assets, jumped 2.6% on Monday, while Goldman Sachs Group Inc. $(GS)$ and Citigroup Inc. (C) were each up around 3.8%, according to FactSet data.

Venezuela hopes in focus

Brian Mulberry, senior client portfolio manager at Zacks Investment Management, said that while geopolitical uncertainty still casts a shadow over the financial markets, investors would not react negatively because any new leadership in Venezuela is likely to increase oil production and help lower diesel prices.

Cheaper diesel then would have "a measurable impact on the delivery of everything for America's consumer-driven economy, and that's why we start to see some of this interest in consumer-discretionary stocks coming back around," he told MarketWatch in a phone interview on Monday.

Shares of Amazon.com Inc. (AMZN) rose 2.9%, while Nike Inc.'s stock $(NKE)$ was up 2% and General Motors Co.'s $(GM)$ surged 2.7%, according to FactSet.

See: Silver and gold are the big winners as investors look for safety following the U.S. intervention in Venezuela

Precious metals such as gold (GC00) and silver (SI00) were also rising on Monday, emerging as the big winners of flight-to-safety trades following the U.S. intervention in Venezuela.

Mulberry said investors simply rotated into "higher-quality assets" from crypto (BTCUSD) in anticipation of reduced crypto transactions tied to Venezuela.

"If there's going to be fewer crypto trades coming from Venezuela and the narco trafficking, it would imply that there would be less crypto transactions, so investors are just moving away from crypto assets into the actual precious metals as a safe haven," he said.

-Isabel Wang

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January 05, 2026 16:35 ET (21:35 GMT)

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