June 12 (Reuters) - The benchmark S&P 500 and the blue-chip

Dow opened higher on Friday, underpinned by hopes for an

imminent Middle East peace deal, while investors geared up for

the market debut of Elon Musk's SpaceX, which is estimated to be

Wall Street's biggest public listing in history.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 300.0 points,

or 0.59%, at the open to 51,148.73. The S&P 500 rose 16.6

points, or 0.22%, at the open to 7,410.85​, while the Nasdaq

Composite dropped 26.3 points, or 0.10%, to 25,783.359

at the opening bell.

(Reporting by Johann M Cherian in Bengaluru; Editing by

Shinjini Ganguli)