Stocks finished a holiday-shortened session at new 2009 highs following positive reports on U.S. durable-goods orders and unemployment. A weaker U.S. dollar also helped the market, pushing energy and materials stocks higher. Trading was extremely light ahead of the holiday weekend. Orders to U.S. factories for durable goods rose slightly in November, but orders excluding transportation items jumped 2 percent, double the increase that analysts expected. Meanwhile, new claims for jobless benefits fell 28,000 to 452,000 last week, the best performance since September 2008. The U.S. dollar was mixed versus other currencies, falling versus the euro and rising versus the yen. Light sweet crude oil for February delivery rose 58 cents to $77.25 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange. Gold for February delivery rose $10 to $1,104 an ounce. For the year, the major indexes are on track to post strong gains. The Dow industrials are up 19 percent, the broader Standard & Poor's 500 has risen 24 percent, and the technology-heavy Nasdaq has surged 44 percent. The New York Stock Exchange composite index rose 37.80 to 7,255.00. The American Stock Exchange composite index rose 8.16 to 1,824.38. And the Russell 2000 index rose 3.09 to 634.07.
