NEW YORK - Wall Street regained its upward momentum Friday
as the market extended its feel-good rally amid brighter economic
prospects.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 36.28 points (0.37 percent)
to hit a fresh 11-month high of 9,820.20, a day after investors
locked in profits and took a breather after a long market
rally.
The key blue-chip Dow index has rebounded more than 45 percent from
its March lows.
The tech-heavy Nasdaq composite climbed 6.11 points (0.29 percent)
to 2,132.86 while the broad-market Standard & Poor's 500 index
added 2.81 points (0.26 percent) to 1,068.30 for its ninth gain in
11 sessions.
All the three key stock indexes advanced more than two percent on
the week.
There was no fresh economic news on Friday, but analysts at
Barclays Capital boosted their growth outlook for the United
States, calling for an acceleration to a 5.0 percent expansion by
early 2010 before settling back to a more sustainable pace.
Barclays economist Dean Maki said that based on historical data,
"the strength of a recovery has been proportional to the depth of
the recession" and added that "by that standard, our peak quarter
of 5.0 percent growth can actually be thought of as
conservative."
"There weren't any major news items or economic items to act as
positive trading catalysts this session, but the market's bullish
bias still came through," analysts at Briefing.com said in a
note.
Volatility picked up on end of quarter expiration of four key
equity contracts in the futures and options markets, analysts
said.
"We believe a big part of the rally lately has been due to
aggressive traders and hedge funds," said Wells Fargo Advisors
chief market strategist Al Goldman.
Among the laggards was smart phone maker Palm, which reported a
smaller-than-expected first quarter loss and
larger-than-anticipated revenues but offered disappointing second
quarter revenue guidance.
It fell 2.98 percent to 14.01 dollars.
Texas Instruments rose 1.95 percent to 24.06 dollars after the
semiconductor maker raised its dividend.
Procter & Gamble jumped 3.22 percent to 57.32 dollars after
analysts at Citigroup upgraded the consumer-staples bellwether
stock.
Oil giant Chevron rose 0.93 percent to 72.64 dollars while Internet
giant Google gained 0.05 percent to 491.46 dollars.
The bond market fell. The yield on the 10-year Treasury bond rose
to 3.474 percent from 3.398 percent Thursday while that on the
30-year bond climbed to 4.231 percent from 4.178 percent a day
earlier.
- AFP /ls