Stocks rose yesterday, extending Thursday's big rally and closing out the Dow Jones industrial average's first winning week in two months, as investors placed bets that the corporate earnings slump may be coming to an end. The Dow Jones rose 60.07 points, or 0.57 per cent, to finish at 10,539.06.

"We don't see a particular catalyst today, just a continued change in sentiment back to positive," said Dan Ascani, president of Global Market Strategists.

For the week, the Dow gained 2.8 per cent - the first weekly gain since the week ended May 18th - the Nasdaq composite rose 4 per cent and the S&P 500 grew 2.1 per cent.

Yesterday's follow through came after the biggest stock-market rally in two months on Thursday, sparked primarily by Microsoft the world's No. 1 software company and Dow component told investors to expect an improvement in quarterly sales.