Markets rise, thanks to summit

U.S. and global markets rose modestly on Monday, as investors made preparations for President Donald Trump’s meeting with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un in Singapore.

European investors also focused on Italy’s new government, and its future using the euro.

The Dow Jones industrial average rose 5.78 points, or less than 0.1 percent, to 25,322.31. The Standard & Poor’s 500 index rose 2.97 points, or 0.1 percent, to 2,782.00 and the Nasdaq composite rose 14.41 points, or 0.2 percent, to 7,659.93.

Investors spent most of Monday waiting for Tuesday’s meeting between Trump and Kim, aimed at settling a standoff over the North’s nuclear arsenal.

The Federal Reserve will start a two-day meeting on interest rates on Tuesday, wrapping up on Wednesday. Investors expect the nation’s central bank to raise interest rates from their current level of 1.75 percent to 2 percent, but most attention will be on how many rate hikes Fed officials are considering doing later this year.

German diesel scandal deepens

Germany’s car industry suffered fresh damage Monday after prosecutors said a top Volkswagen manager was a suspect in a criminal inquiry and officials ordered Daimler to recall hundreds of thousands of vehicles equipped with illegal emissions-cheating software.

Munich prosecutors said they had opened a fraud investigation into Rupert Stadler, leader of Volkswagen’s Audi division and a member of the Volkswagen management board.

Stadler, whose home was raided by investigators Monday, is the first active member of Volkswagen’s upper echelon to be identified as a suspect in the inquiry.

Later in the day, the German Transport Ministry ordered Daimler to recall 774,000 vehicles in Europe because of emissions software.

China tests a solar highway

A section of highway in China is paved, not with asphalt, but with solar panels. The potential appeal of solar roads is clear: Generating electricity from highways and streets could conserve a lot of land. The electricity could be used practically next door to where it is generated, meaning virtually no power would be lost in transmission. And the land is essentially free, because roads are needed anyway.

The experiment is the latest sign of China’s desire to innovate in, and dominate, the market for renewable energy.

The country already produces three-quarters of the solar panels sold globally, and its wind-turbine manufacturing industry is also among the world’s largest.

— From wire reports