Dow, S&P 500 near flat after rally; Apple boosts Nasdaq

Caterpillar shares helped cap losses in the Dow industrials even as the company posted a 55 percent drop in quarterly profit due to a charge connected with accounting fraud at a Chinese subsidiary and weak demand among its dealers. Caterpillar's shares, down 2.2 percent in the past three sessions, rose 1.5 percent Monday to USD 96.97.

Boeing , down 1.2 percent at USD 74.14, shares led decliners on the Dow. The aircraft maker risks losing about USD 5 billion in revenue by the grounding of its 787 Dreamliner fleet, according to a Bloomberg report.

The S&P 500 is coming off a streak of eight sessions of gains, the longest in eight years, but the index remained above 1,500. It ended above that level on Friday for the first time in more than five years.

"I think this multi-year high is really something that's in play both for short-term traders and for folks with money on the sidelines," said Bucky Hellwig, senior vice president at BB&T Wealth Management in Birmingham, Alabama.

Investors poured USD 55 billion in new cash into stock mutual funds and exchange-traded funds in January, the biggest monthly inflow on record, research provider TrimTabs Investment Research said.

Bargain hunters lifted Apple