Stock Prices Move Up With Bonds On Talk of Lower Interest Rates
Still taking cues from the bond market, stock prices moved higher in active trading as visions of lower interest rates danced once again in investors' heads.</br></br>The session started off sluggishly, but activity picked up as the bond market caught fire. The Dow Jones Industrial Average climbed more than eight points before midday and held much of that gain throughout the session. The industrial index closed up 8.25 at 1527.29.</br></br>Just a week earlier, the index registered a historic plunge on fears that interest rates could move higher. The reason for the bond market's excitement yesterday was rather slim, based on reports that the West German economics minister expects the U.S. to seek a coordinated interest-rate reduction plan when it meets with finance ministers of its four major allies this weekend. The minister was expressing his opinions, not official policy, and the reports were later denied.</br></br>The stock market was just "looking for an excuse to rally," said Hildegarde Zagorski, a market strategist at Prudential-Bache Securities in New York. She added that a small rebound after last week's fall wasn't surprising.</br></br>Yesterday's rally was broad based, however. Gaining issues had a better than 2-to-1 lead over decliners on the New York Stock Exchange, where volume rose to 122.4 million shares from 113.9 million shares Tuesday.