Wall Street rises as investor digesting testimony from U.S. gov't

NEW YORK, Sept. 23 (Xinhua) -- Wall Street was moderately higher Tuesday, as investors tracked testimony from top U.S. economic officials before Congress on a 700 billion U.S. dollars financial rescue plan.

Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson, Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke and Securities and Exchange Commission Chairman Christopher Cox testified before Congress. Bernanke warned lawmakers that failure to enact a rescue plan to rid banks of bad assets would threaten markets and the U.S. economy.

Technology shares rose strongly, as investors snapped up these stocks at their cheapest level over 10 years. Dell and Microsoft led the rally.

Banks gained, led by Wells Fargo, following a weak opening, as Oppenheimer & Co. analyst Meredith Whitney cut earnings for U.S. banks again, saying "We believe any government bailout plan has little hope of improving core fundamentals over the near and medium term."

Investors also closely watched oil prices, following the biggest one-day gain ever on Monday. Light, sweet crude for November delivery fell two dollars to 107.37 U.S. dollars a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange.

The Dow Jones rose 66.27 to 11,081.96. Broader indexes also inched up. The Standard & Poor's 500 index rose 4.19 to 1,211.28 and the Nasdaq climbed 15.05 to 2,194.83.