By Ryan Vlastelica
NEW YORK (Reuters) - Stocks were flat on Tuesday as investors found little reason to keep pushing shares higher after comments from Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke sparked a rally in the previous session.
Bernanke signaled that supportive monetary policy will remain even though the job picture has begun to improve. The Fed chief said the economy needs to grow more quickly to bring the unemployment rate down further.
The S&P has gained 12.6 percent so far this year, putting it near four-year highs, which some investors believe will make further gains more difficult. The nearly 6-month rally has come partly after accommodative measures by central banks around the world.
"There's very little reason to sell now that Bernanke has provided another leg of support for the equity market by suggesting that unconventional monetary policy will be here for a long time," said Andrew Wilkinson, chief economic strategist at Miller Tabak & Co in New York.
Wilkinson said while he sees further rises for equities over the next few months, any near-term advance might be limited. "The recent gains have taken us to our highest in four years, so we're in somewhat new territory," he said.
The Dow Jones industrial average <.DJI> was up 9.31 points, or 0.07 percent, at 13,250.94. The Standard & Poor's 500 Index <.SPX> was up 1.69 points, or 0.12 percent, at 1,418.20. The Nasdaq Composite Index <.IXIC> was up 4.18 points, or 0.13 percent, at 3,126.75.
Friday is the final trading day of the first quarter, and the S&P is on track for its biggest quarterly gain since 2009.
U.S. single-family home prices were unchanged in January, according to the S&P/Case-Shiller index, suggesting the battered housing market continued to crawl along the bottom. Equities barely budged after the data.
Homebuilder Lennar Corp
Apollo Group Inc
Map Pharmaceuticals Inc
(Editing by Jeffrey Benkoe)
