NEW YORK - US stocks rallied Wednesday after robust earnings from investment bank Morgan Stanley and delivery giant FedEx helped the market break out of the summer doldrums.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average jumped 103.34 points (0.94 percent) to 11,078.18, while the Nasdaq composite leapt 34.15 points (1.62 percent) to 2,141.21 at the closing bell.
The broad-market Standard and Poor's 500 index advanced 11..92 points (0.96 percent) to a preliminary close of 1,252.04.
While the market has been languishing in the past three sessions, a wave of buying interest was sparked by the surprisingly strong earnings reports that helped shift the focus away from economic and geopolitical worries.
The strong profits gave the market "some reassurance that profitability (so far) is holding up despite rising interest rates," said analysts at Briefing.com.
06/21/2006 20:11 GMT