Stocks break losing streak, todays news

Wall Street crawls back after a two-session plunge, as oil prices retreat from recent records and the dollar recovers.
Stocks rose Thursday, ending a two-session losing streak, as oil prices took a break from the recent march higher, allowing investors to dip back in to equities.
Bond prices slumped, boosting the corresponding yields for the second session, on ongoing concerns about rising inflation.
The Dow Jones industrial average (INDU) added 0.2% and the broader Standard & Poor's 500 (SPX) index added 0.3%. The Nasdaq composite (COMP) added 0.7%.
Stocks had been stronger in the early afternoon, but the advance lost some steam by the close, ahead of the long holiday weekend. All financial markets are closed Monday for Memorial Day, and some Wall Street pros will be making a four-day weekend of it - skipping out early or altogether on Friday.
Stocks tumbled in the previous two sessions, with the Dow losing more than 425 points, as investors reacted to skyrocketing oil and gas prices, plus a gloomy economic and inflation outlook from the Fed.
The focus this week has been all about oil prices, and how market participants see its rise in relation to bets about consumer spending, said John Wilson, chief technical strategist at Morgan Keegan.
"As oil has been rising for some time now, every $10 or so, the market has stopped to asses it and determined, OK, we can handle this," Wilson said. "But when oil hit $130 and $135 this week, the realization set in that, yeah, the consumer is really going to get hit."
A slight retreat from those highs Thursday was giving stocks a lift, he said, but investors don't believe that the runup in oil prices is done, so stock gains were minimal.
Markets Friday will likely take a cue from the April existing-home sales report, due out before the start of trade. There are no market-moving earnings expected.

Commodities:
Oil prices hit a record high above $135 a barrel before retreating. Gas prices hit another all-time high, inching ever closer to $4 a gallon. Gold prices declined.
U.S. light crude oil for July delivery hit a new electronic trading record of $135.09 a barrel before pulling back to settle at $130.81 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange, a decline of about $2.36. Read full story on this site.

source: cnnmoney.com