U.S. stocks rose Thursday, led by gains in utilities and healthcare companies, while oil prices were little changed after rising the day before. Pharmacyclics, a pharmaceutical company that makes leukemia drug Imbruvica, surged more than 10 percent after AbbVie said it would acquire the company for $21 billion. European stock markets rose strongly as the European Central Bank (ECB) upgraded its growth forecast for the eurozone in 2015 to 1.5 percent from an earlier prediction of 1 percent. In U.S. economic news, jobless claims rose to a 10-month high last week but remained at a level consistent with an improving labor market, factory orders fell unexpectedly for a sixth consecutive month, and worker productivity fell while labor costs rose, the government said in three reports. At noon on Wall Street, the benchmark Standard & Poor's 500 index was up 0.2 percent, the Dow industrials rose 0.3 percent, and the technology-heavy Nasdaq composite index gained 0.4 percent. Benchmark West Texas Intermediate (WTI) crude futures were down slightly to below $51.50 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange, one day after the contract rose 2 percent.
