The Dow Jones industrial average gained 67.73 points to close at 6,833.10, jumping past 6,800 for the first time en route to its fourth new high this week and eighth in 10 sessions. The Dow's first move above 6,800 came only about three months after the blue-chip barometer broke past the 6,000 mark.
The Standard & Poor's 500-stock index climbed 6.42 to 776.17, and the NYSE's composite index rose 3.19 to 409.31. The Nasdaq composite index surged 8.60 to 1,349.06, and the American Stock Exchange index rose 2.59 to 589.95.
NYSE volume totaled 532.44 million shares, vs. 532.31 million shares yesterday.
Continued enthusiasm over this week's encouraging corporate earnings reports helped offset potentially unsettling news on the economy and inflation.
The Federal Reserve reported this morning that industrial production rose 0.8 percent in December, more than many analysts had expected and the latest in a stream of strong economic readings that have raised inflation concerns.
Bonds initially slid after the report, boosting the yield on the 30-year Treasury - a key determinant of corporate and consumer borrowing costs - as high as 6.85 percent from late Thursday's 6.82 percent. But the Treasury market recovered most of the drop, taking pressure off stocks, with the yield finishing almost unchanged at 6.83 percent.
"The markets look ahead rather than backward," said Alfred E. Goldman, vice president at A.G. Edwards & Sons Inc. in St. Louis. "What they think is the economy isn't going to pick up too much steam.