Major benchmarks got off to a slow start on Monday morning, as investors remained worried about the rising tensions between the U.S. and Iran. Having ignored geopolitical risk for a long time, market participants have now shifted their focus to assessing military threats even as they continue to keep trade and broader economic concerns in the back of their minds. Yet investors remained resilient, and as of 11 a.m. EST, the Dow Jones Industrial Average (DJINDICES: ^DJI) had recovered from triple-digit losses to be down 75 points to 28,559. The S&P 500 (SNPINDEX: ^GSPC) lost a point to 3,234, and the Nasdaq Composite (NASDAQINDEX: ^IXIC) managed to gain 12 points to 9,033.
The rise in military tensions helped the gold market, and that spurred greater interest in Newmont Goldcorp (NYSE: NEM), which gave shareholders a nice reward. Meanwhile, Xerox Holdings (NYSE: XRX) said that it has managed to come up with financing sources for its ambitious takeover bid for HP (NYSE: HPQ), turning attention back to a merger that many had dismissed as unlikely.
Shares of Newmont Goldcorp were up almost 1% after the gold mining giant said it would "significantly increase" its quarterly dividend. The move came in response to favorable developments in the gold market, which is a common safe-haven play for investors fleeing the broader stock market.