US STOCKS-Stimulus bets drive Wall Street higher

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* Senate Republicans set to vote on more payroll funding
* Insurer Travelers up after profit beat
* P&G gains after full-year sales forecast raise
* Netflix shares reverse course to trade lower ahead of
results
* Indexes up: Dow 0.41%, S&P 0.36%, Nasdaq 0.23%

(Adds comment, details; Updates prices)
By Medha Singh and Shivani Kumaresan
Oct 20 (Reuters) - Wall Street's main indexes rose on
Tuesday as investors hoped for more stimulus from Washington,
with Senate Republicans preparing to vote on a bill to help
small businesses hammered by the COVID-19 pandemic.
House of Representatives Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Treasury
Secretary Steven Mnuchin will also talk again on Tuesday, after
a 53-minute telephone conversation on Monday "continued to
narrow their differences" about the coronavirus aid package, a
Pelosi spokesman said on Twitter. "It's mostly hopes that we are going to get a stimulus deal
going today and we will have money in the pockets of majority of
Americans who are suffering most from the pandemic," said David
Trainer, chief executive officer of New Constructs, an
investment research firm.
Uncertainty over the fiscal stimulus weighed on Wall
Street's main indexes on Monday and analysts expect market
turbulence to increase with only two weeks left until Election
Day.
Latest national opinion polls pointed to a victory for
Democratic challenger Joe Biden, which would mean a cooling in
global trade friction, but higher taxes for corporate America.
Meanwhile, the third-quarter earnings season has gathered
momentum. Of the 66 S&P 500 companies that have reported
results, 86.4% have topped expectations for earnings, according
to Refinitiv IBES data.
Property and casualty insurer Travelers Cos Inc TRV.N
gained 3.7% as it beat quarterly profit expectations, while
consumer products giant Procter & Gamble Co PG.N advanced 1.2%
as it raised its full-year sales and earnings forecast.
All 11 major S&P sectors were up with financials .SPNY
tracking U.S. Treasury yields. US/
At 11:23 a.m. ET the Dow Jones Industrial Average .DJI
rose 137.42 points, or 0.49%, to 28,332.84 and the .SPX gained
18.13 points, or 0.54%, to 3,445.05. The Nasdaq Composite
.IXIC gained 45.05 points, or 0.39%, to 11,523.93.
Netflix Inc NFLX.O dipped 1% ahead of its third-quarter
earnings report. International Business Machines Corp IBM.N edged past
estimates for quarterly revenue on Monday, bolstered by higher
demand for its cloud services. The company's shares, however,
fell 3.3% after it stayed away from issuing a current-quarter
forecast, citing economic uncertainty related to the pandemic.
The U.S. Justice Department and 11 states filed an antitrust
lawsuit against Alphabet Inc's GOOGL.O Google for allegedly
breaking the law in using its market power to fend off rivals.
Alphabet's shares were up 0.2%. Advancing issues outnumbered decliners for a 2.90-to-1 ratio
on the NYSE and a 1.36-to-1 ratio on the Nasdaq.
The S&P index recorded 11 new 52-week highs and one new low,
while the Nasdaq recorded 47 new highs and 17 new lows.