US stocks lifted by financials as dollar pauses

Wall Street stocks opened higher Thursday after big US banks cleared Federal Reserve stress tests and the dollar retreated from a 12-year high.
Five minutes into trade, the Dow Jones Industrial Average was at 17,754.13, up 118.74 points (0.67 percent).
The broad-based S&P 500 rose 11.84 (0.58 percent) to 2,052.08, while the tech-rich Nasdaq Composite Index gained 13.50 (0.28 percent) at 4,863.44.
Citigroup jumped 3.3 and Morgan Stanley gained 4.0 percent on higher dividend and shareholder repurchase announcements following the Fed's approval of their capital plans.
Bank of America rose 0.4 percent after it announced a new share repurchase plan following a conditional passing grade from the US central bank that gives it until September to remedy weaknesses in its capital plan.
The euro rose to $1.0612 from $1.0548, pausing from a rally in the wake of a European Central Bank bond-buying program launched Monday. The stronger dollar has weighed on equities recently as investors worried about its negative impact on multinational companies' profits.