Investing.com -- The release of last month's minutes from the Federal Reserve Bank's open market committee earlier today sent the four major stock market indexes soaring, but the Dow, though closing higher, is still struggling to get past the 20,000 closing mark.
At 3:30 p.m. Eastern, the Dow Jones Industrial Average (DJIA) was up at 19941.16.
The Nasdaq Composite also increased, at 5478.30.
The S&P 500 was up at 2270.61, and the Russell 2000 index increased to 1385.11.
The VIX, the volatility index, was down for the day.
The Dow closed the day at 19942.16, up 0.30% for the day. That was an increase of 60.40 points.
The Nasdaq finished the day at 5477.00, up 12.92 points, or 0.57%.
The S&P 500 increased by 0.57% to 2270.75, a surge of 12.92 points.
Fed officials in December approved their first interest rate hike in a year based in large part on market reactions to the presidential election, the just-released minutes show.
The dramatic impact of Donald Trump's election win was on the minds of Fed governors, as the FOMC unanimously approved a quarter-point hike that pushed the target range for its short-term lending rate to between 0.5% and 0.75% and the group also voiced a more aggressive path forward.
There was no explicit mention of President-elect Trump, the economic and political reverberations from the election on markets and the economy were discussed in depth.
The committee's economic projections noted "substantial uncertainty" about fiscal policy for 2017. But, members noted that "more expansionary fiscal policy" raised the possibility of "somewhat tighter monetary policy than currently anticipated."