By Avantika Chilkoti

U.S. stocks ticked higher Monday, as investors prepared for a week filled with fresh economic data and more corporate earnings reports.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average climbed 36 points, or 0.1%, to 27187. The S&P 500 added 0.3% and the Nasdaq Composite rose 0.4%.

Investors braced for fresh economic data this week as expectations for interest-rate cuts from major central banks grow. Reports on new-home sales and durable-goods orders are on tap Wednesday and Thursday. Meanwhile, the U.S. Commerce Department will report second-quarter growth figures on Friday.

As central banks across the globe are expected to undertake fresh stimulus measures in the coming months, investors are looking ahead to policy meetings from the Federal Reserve next week and the European Central Bank on Thursday.

"In the next six months we are looking for evidence that either 'Goldilocks' continues or we get greater evidence that the global economy is slowing down," said Paul Brain, head of fixed income at Newton Investment Management, the BNY Mellon subsidiary, referring to the period when the global economy has been neither too hot nor too cold.

Earnings season is in full swing, with Google parent Alphabet, e-commerce giant Amazon and social-networking company Facebook among notable companies reporting quarterly results later in the week. Second-quarter earnings for S&P 500 companies are expected to fall 2.1% from a year earlier, according to FactSet.

In Monday's action, Shares of Equifax rose 1.3% after the credit-reporting company said it would pay $700 million to settle a nationwide class-action lawsuit related to a breach in 2017 the exposed the data of close to 150 million Americans.

Halliburton topped analysts' profit estimates in the second quarter, but the oil-field-services company said its business in North America slowed down. Halliburton shares jumped 5.1%. Meanwhile, shares in DaVita, the kidney care services group, advanced 6% after the company released preliminary results and launched a share buyback plan.

In commodities, the price of Brent crude rose 0.8% to $63.96 a barrel as tensions mounted in the Persian Gulf. Iran seized a British-flagged tanker in the Persian Gulf on Friday.

Elsewhere, the Stoxx 600 in Europe edged up 0.3%. In Asia, China's benchmark Shanghai Composite Index and Hong Kong's Hang Seng fell 1.3% and 1.4%, respectively.

--Joanne Chiu contributed to this article.

Write to Avantika Chilkoti at Avantika.Chilkoti@wsj.com

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

July 22, 2019 10:03 ET (14:03 GMT)

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