NEW YORK, New York - Technology stocks were all the rage in New York on Tuesday, pushing the broader industrial stocks higher in their wake.

Across the globe, stocks roared as markets breathed relief that new Covid variant Omicron is not as severe as initially expected.

"A week ago we saw a big scare because of Omicron and over the following week it appeared to be very contagious but less severe than people were worried about," Peter Tuz, president of Chase Investment Counsel in Charlottesville, Virginia told Reuters Tuesday.

The Nasdaq Composite surged 455.72 points, or 2.99%, to 15,680.87.

The Standard and Poor's 500 jumped 95.17 points, or 2.07% to close Tuesday at 4,686.84.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average gained 492.21 points or 1.42% to 35,719.24.

In Germany, the Dax rallied 2.82 percent. In Paris, the CAC 40 climbed 2.91 percent. The FTSE 100 in London advanced 1.49 percent.

On Asian markets, the biggest mover was Hong Kong's Hang Seng which rallied 634.28 points or 2.72 percent to 23,983.66.

In Japan, the Nikkei 225 advanced 528.23 points or 1.89 percent to 28,455.60.

The Australian All Ordinaries added 82.20 points or 1.09 percent to 7,611.20.

China's Shanghai Composite edged up 5.78 points or 0.16 percent to 3,595.09.

On foreign exchange markets, the dollar bloc gained ground. The Canadian dollar jumped to 1.2641 by the New York close Tuesday. The Australian dollar was in demand, rising to 0.7118. The New Zealand dollar swelled to 0.6788.

The U.S. dollar forced the euro lower to 1.1268. The British pound fell to 1.3241. The Japanese yen was slightly lower at 113.56. The Swiss franc was unchanged at 0.9248.