Late buying rescues
market from slump

NEW YORK >> Investors struggled past concerns over a potential terror strike yesterday, sending stocks modestly higher following an upbeat earnings report from Procter & Gamble Co. and a positive reading on manufacturing activity.

Financial stocks were under pressure following warnings from the government over the weekend that financial institutions including the New York Stock Exchange, Citigroup Inc., Prudential Financial Inc. and the World Bank could be targeted by terrorists.

But after spending much of the day in a slump, major market indicators ended modestly higher following a late round of buying, repeating a pattern now familiar from recent trading sessions.

The Dow Jones industrial average closed up 39.45 or 0.4 percent, at 10,179.16. It was the Dow's fifth straight advance, its longest rally of the year and the first time since late November-early December that it put together five consecutive winning sessions.

Other market indicators also rose. The Standard & Poor's 500 index rose 4.90 or 0.4 percent at 1,106.62 and the Nasdaq composite index was up 4.73 or 0.3 percent at 1,892.09.

Bryan Piskorowski, a market analyst at Wachovia Securities based in Richmond, Va., attributed the late-afternoon bounce to the fact that the market has been oversold in the past six weeks rather than a turnaround in sentiment.

"We toughed it out today," Piskorowski said. Despite the afternoon comeback, Piskorowski noted that trading volume was light. "You don't get much of a sense of conviction. ... It's hard to conjure up a scenario for an up, up and away August."

Financial institutions in New York and Washington, including the NYSE and the Citigroup headquarters building, were under extra scrutiny yesterday after the government gave an unusually detailed warning of possible terrorist attacks against them.

Police officers armed with assault weapons patrolled the sidewalks outside the NYSE in Manhattan's financial district as well as the Citigroup headquarters building in midtown.

In a bid to reassure investors, New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg and Gov. George Pataki rang the opening bell yesterday on the NYSE and urged the financial community to go about its business.

Sam Stovall, chief investment strategist at Standard & Poor's, said concerns about terrorism, along with high oil prices and uncertainty about the economy, have been part of what investors are calling Wall Street's "wall of worry."

"And it's not just everyday terrorism concerns. It's linked to the conventions, the Olympics," Stovall said. "How do you factor in an unknown event?"

Even amid the new terror concerns, a strong earnings report from leading consumer products maker Procter & Gamble helped provide an underpinning for enthusiasm on the market.