Global stocks, dollar up on U.S. rate hike bets, Trump relief

By Sinead Carew

NEW YORK (Reuters) - U.S. Treasury yields rose along with the U.S. dollar and Wall Street rallied, lifting the Dow above 21,000, as investors increased bets on an imminent interest rate hike and gave a sigh of relief after President Donald Trump's speech to Congress.

The S&P 500 and Nasdaq had their best one-day gain since Nov. 7, one day before Trump's election, and they also closed at record highs along with the Dow. The global MSCI ACWI index , rose 0.9 percent and also hit a record.

Financial stocks were the biggest boost for Wall Street after hawkish comments from two prominent Federal Reserve Officials as higher rates help bank profits.

In his speech Tuesday, Trump pledged to deliver "massive" tax relief to the middle class and corporate tax cuts, to spend heavily on infrastructure and to ease regulations.

While some investors had hoped for specifics on how the administration would pay for its promises, investors who had kept money off the table ahead of the speech were relieved by the President's more measured than expected tone.

"People were concerned Trump was maybe running off the rails. After the speech last night everybody walked away with a good feeling," said Stephen Massocca, Senior Vice President at Wedbush Securities in San Francisco. "Some of the things he said, the algebra doesn't work but people know the direction it's going to go."

But the rally may be short. If Congress puts up roadblocks to Trump's plans or if he starts sounding less presidential, "the air is out of the rally," said Brian Battle, director of trading at Performance Trust Capital Partners in Chicago.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average ended up 303.31 points, or 1.46 percent, at 21,115.55, the S&P 500 rose 32.32 points, or 1.37 percent, to 2,395.96 and the Nasdaq Composite added 78.59 points, or 1.35 percent, to 5,904.03.

Yields on 2-year U.S. Treasuries hit a more than seven year peak on increased bets on a March rate hike. [

Investors are now pricing in around a 66.4-percent probability of a March hike, according to CME Group's FedWatch tool. They had priced in only around a 35-percent chance that the Fed would move this month before the Fed comments.

The yield on 2-year Treasury notes rose to a high of 1.308 percent, its highest since August 2009 while the 10-year notes' yield rose to 2.471 percent, the highest since Feb. 16.

"Between the risk-on move in equities and this fear that we could get a rate hike (in two weeks), we saw a lot of traders scramble and start to price in that eventuality, which meant they had to start selling a lot of their bonds," said Kim Rupert, managing director of global fixed income analysis at Action Economics in San Francisco.

The dollar rose 0.6 percent against a basket of currencies and touched its highest level since Jan. 11 .

In commodity markets, oil futures turned negative after U.S. crude inventories rose to a record high. U.S. crude settled down 0.3 percent at $53.83 while Brent crude settled down 0.27 percent at $56.36.

Gold , dropped 0.14 percent to 1,246.62 an ounce, extending Tuesday's drop.

(Additional reporting by Dion Rabouin and Saqib Ahmed in New York, Noel Randewich in San Francisco, Helen Reid, Jamie McGeever and Dhara Ranasinghe in London, and Nichola Saminather in Singapore; Editing by Nick Zieminski)