Stock market live today: Dow futures jump, reopening trades rise, big deals boost sentiment

This is a live blog. Please check back for updates. 

Bullish sentiment on Wall Street is against a backdrop of rising coronavirus cases at home and abroad. The World Health Organization said Saturday that more than 200,000 coronavirus cases were confirmed over a 24-hour span, a record. The largest spike was seen in the Americas, where nearly 130,000 new cases were confirmed. Florida and Texas reported daily record spikes of 11,445 and 8,258, respectively, on Saturday. – Fitzgerald

Berkshire Hathaway is spending $4 billion to buy the natural gas transmission and storage assets of Dominion Energy, marking the conglomerate’s first deal since the coronavirus crisis and its biggest purchase in years. Including the assumption of debt, the deal totals almost $10 billion. With the deal, Dominion is transitioning to a pure-play regulated utility company that focuses on clean energy production from wind, solar and natural gas. Prior to the announcement, Warren Buffett revealed that Berkshire had built up a record $137 billion cash hoard and he was looking to make an “elephant-sized acquisition.” —Li 

Uber agreed to purchase food-delivery service Postmates, the two companies said Monday. Postmates is the fourth-largest U.S. food delivery service by market share. The company has had success in specific urban areas such as Los Angeles and Miami. — Fitzgerald 

Shares of ride hailing giant Uber rose 6.5% in premarket trading on Monday following multiple reports that Uber has agreed on a deal to buy food delivery service Postmates in a $2.65 billion stock deal. Earlier this year, Uber was in talks to buy Grubhub; however, the deal never materialized and Grubhub was purchased by Europe’s Just Eat Takeaway.com. —Fitzgerald 

U.S. equity futures traded sharply higher on Monday, extending last week’s strong performance to start to second half of the year. Dow futures rose about 345 points, or 1.3% The move implied a higher open by about 400 points. The S&P 500 and Nasdaq-100 futures were 1.1% higher. Stocks whose performance hinges on the reopening of the economy rose in premarket trading. 

Stocks are coming off a strong start to the third quarter and second half of 2020. The Dow Jones Industrial Average and S&P 500 rose 3.3% and 4%, respectively, last week. The Nasdaq advanced 4.6% in the holiday-shortened week. — Fitzgerald 

Subscribe to CNBC PRO for exclusive insights and analysis, and live business day programming from around the world.