Dow rises 66.5

NEW YORK -- Stocks rose sharply today, with the Standard & Poor's 500 cruising to another record and the Dow Jones industrial average reaching its highest level since late May.

The Dow rose 66.51 points to 9,091.77, lifting this year's gain to 15 percent and pulling the blue-chip index to just 120 points below May 13's record close of 9,211.84. It was the Dow's highest finish since May 22.

Advancers outnumbered decliners by a 4-to-3 margin on the New York Stock Exchange, with 1,736 up, 1,287 down and 521 unchanged.

NYSE volume totaled 513.22 million shares, almost even with Thursday's pre-holiday tally of 509.40 million. The NYSE composite index rose 5.02 to a record 590.82.

The S&P 500 rose 10.89 to 1,157.31, extending this year's gain to 19.25 percent.

The Nasdaq composite index rose 15.43 to 1,909.43, about 8 points from April 22's record of 1,917.61. The technology-heavy index slid 20 points on Thursday amid some profit-taking on its 11.6 percent surge of recent weeks.

Smaller-company measures continued to lag the blue-chip advance, and remained well below record terrain. The Russell 2000 rose 1.66 to 459.97, and the American Stock Exchange composite index rose 3.20 to 725.12.

The price of the Treasury's main 30-year bond was up 13/32 point, or $4.06 per $1,000 in face value, around by late today, while its yield fell to 5.57 percent from 5.60 percent Thursday before the long holiday weekend.

Tokyo's Nikkei stock average fell 1.0 percent, Frankfurt's DAX index fell 0.6 percent and London's FTSE 100 edged higher.