Encouraging economic reports drive gains
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U.S. stocks rose last week, breaking a two-week losing streak, as worker productivity, manufacturing and home-sales figures beat economists' projections and Warren E. Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway made its biggest purchase ever.
General Electric climbed the most in the Dow Jones industrial average on analyst upgrades, and Lennar led home builders higher. Burlington Northern Santa Fe soared 29 percent as Buffett agreed to buy the second-biggest U.S. railroad in what he called an "all-in wager on the economic future of the United States." Black & Decker also jumped 29 percent as Stanley Works said it would purchase the maker of power tools.
The Standard & Poor's 500-stock index rose every day, increasing 3.2 percent to 1069.30. The Dow gained 310.69 points, or 3.2 percent, to 10,023.42. The Nasdaq composite index increased 3.3 percent, to 2112.44.
"The ability of the market to rally on the heels of the M&A [mergers and acquisitions] activity and pretty solid earnings reports has been encouraging," said Eric Mintz, a portfolio manager at Eagle Asset Management. "The recent pullback certainly appears to have reversed itself."
Stocks also got a boost from the Federal Reserve, which left its key interest rate unchanged and said it plans to leave it "exceptionally low" for "an extended period." The market maintained its advance even after the Labor Department reported that the nation's unemployment rate jumped to a higher-than-forecast 10.2 percent in October, the highest level since 1983.
The Treasury is scheduled to sell a record $81 billion in its quarterly auctions of long-term debt this week. It plans to sell $30 billion in three-month bills and $31 billion in six-month bills on Monday. It will sell one-month bills the next day.
-- Bloomberg News
