GLOBAL MARKETS-Stocks, yen rise; gold, silver and oil jump amid US-Venezuela tensions

By Caroline Valetkevitch

NEW YORK, Dec 22 (Reuters) - Most major stock indexes were higher at the start of a holiday-shortened week on Monday, with shares of Nvidia NVDA.O rising, while the yen strengthened against the U.S. dollar after Japanese officials warned against "one-sided and sharp" currency moves.

Gold and silver jumped to record highs, and oil prices also rose after the U.S. Coast Guard tried to intercept an oil tanker in international waters near Venezuela a day earlier.

Wall Street stocks were helped in part by a continued rebound in technology stocks, although the advance was broad and almost all of the 11 S&P 500 sectors ended higher. Nvidia was up 1.5%. Reuters reported, citing people familiar with the matter, that Nvidia has told Chinese clients it aims to start shipping its second-most powerful artificial intelligence chips to China before the Lunar New Year holiday in mid-February.

TRADING VOLUMES EXPECTED TO BE LIGHT

With U.S. equity and bond markets closed on Thursday for Christmas, trading volumes could be light through the end of the week.

"The late November downdraft was the intermediate bottom that took many of the technology, AI and data-center names down ... I do believe that was the bottom," said Bruce Zaro, managing director at Granite Wealth Management in Plymouth, Massachusetts.

Now, he said, the market is "entering the Santa Claus period," which is typically a strong time for stocks.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average .DJI rose 227.79 points, or 0.47%, to 48,362.68, the S&P 500 .SPX rose 43.99 points, or 0.64%, to 6,878.49 and the Nasdaq Composite .IXIC rose 121.21 points, or 0.52%, to 23,428.83.

Warner Bros Discovery WBD.O rose 3.5% after Oracle co-founder Larry Ellison agreed to provide a personal guarantee of $40.4 billion of the equity financing for Paramount Skydance's PSKY.O offer to acquire the company. Paramount's shares rose 4.3%.

MSCI's gauge of stocks across the globe .MIWD00000PUS rose 7.10 points, or 0.70%, to 1,015.49. The pan-European STOXX 600 .STOXX index fell 0.13%.

The yen strengthened against the U.S. dollar on a technical recovery.

Atsushi Mimura, Japan's top currency diplomat, told reporters that recent FX moves were one-sided and sharp, adding that the government will take appropriate action against excessive moves. Chief Cabinet Secretary Minoru Kihara also warned about the yen's continued weakness.

Some investors viewed the comments as a hint of intervention from Tokyo.

The dollar declined 0.5% against the yen to 156.94 yen, falling as low as 156.71. It was on track for its largest one-day decline since late November.

Minutes of the Bank of Japan meeting are due on Wednesday, while the head of the central bank speaks to a Japanese business lobby on Christmas Day.

Benchmark U.S. 10-year Treasury yields inched higher with the yield on the 10-year note US10YT=RR last up 1.8 basis points at 4.168%.

Spot gold XAU= was up 2.2% at $4,434.26 per ounce after hitting an all-time high of $4,441.92 earlier. Spot silver XAG= was up 1.9% at $68.40 after hitting a new high of $69.44.

Brent crude LCOc1 rose $1.60 to settle at $62.07 a barrel. U.S. West Texas Intermediate crude futures CLc1 rose $1.49 to settle at $58.01.