U.S. Stocks Rise on Housing Data Amid Obama’s Optimism

Story by Bloomberg
Written by Rita Nazareth and Tom Stoukas

U.S. stocks rose, giving the Standard & Poor’s 500 Index its biggest two-day gain in two months, amid better-than-forecast housing data and as President Barack Obama expressed confidence on a budget agreement.

A measure of homebuilders in S&P indexes jumped 2.9 percent. Freeport-McMoRan Copper & Gold Inc. (FCX) and Newmont Mining Corp. (NEM) rallied more than 1.2 percent to pace gains in commodity producers amid Middle East tension. Cisco (CSCO) Systems Inc. increased 0.6 percent as it agreed to buy closely held Meraki Inc. for $1.2 billion. Lowe’s Cos. (L) surged 7.1 percent after the home- improvement retailer posted profit that beat estimates. Apple Inc. (AAPL) and Amazon.com Inc. (AMZN) added at least 2.3 percent.

The S&P 500 rose 1.5 percent to 1,380.58 at 10:18 a.m. New York time. The Dow Jones Industrial Average climbed 155.90 points, or 1.2 percent, to 12,744.21. Trading in S&P 500 companies was 7.4 percent above the 30-day average at this time of day.

“This change and transition in taxation is much more important for equity allocations going forward than what people realize,” said Michael Shaoul, chairman of New York-based Marketfield Asset Management, which oversees $3.5 billion. He spoke in a phone interview. “The U.S. economy looks pretty good. Earnings are OK. As long as Congress doesn’t absolutely wreck it, it will be fine.”
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-11-19/u-s-stock-futures-advance-amid-optimism-on-budget-talks.html