Wall Street: Wednesday close

WALL Street broke out of its selling funk as quarterly reporting season shifted into high gear. The Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 69.37 points or 0.79% to 8542.48 to break a seven-session selling streak. The Nasdaq Index, which has been showing some resilience over the past week, jumped 21.99 points or 1.6% to 1397.25.

Markets rallied from the outset on the back of earnings reports, most of which met or exceeded lowered expectations. But enthusiasm waned as the session wore on. The Dow, which started the day down 14% on the year, jumped 247 points in the first 40 minutes before sellers emerged.

Analysts said investors feared the rally might be short-lived. The Dow's 3.6% leap on 5 July leaked away in the following two days. News outside of earnings was largely neutral. Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan delivered a second day of testimony before Congress, but did not depart from Tuesday's script.

Quarterly numbers suggesting a recovery in company profits triggered the market re-bound. Boeing climbed $2.07 or 5% to $42.94 on a report investors found to their liking. Ford gained fractionally to $12.52 as it forecast a 'modest profit' for 2002. Citigroup, up 73 cents or 2% to $36.93, and Motorola, higher by 62 cents or 4% to $5.15 pleased shareholders with their numbers.

Investors were apparently willing to declare the worst was over for Intel, which rose $1.08 or 6% to $19.44 even after its figures fell below expectations. JP Morgan eased 36 cents or 1.3% to $28.14 on worries about its exposure to troubled companies including WorldCom.

Capital One, the fifth-biggest US issuer of Visa and Mastercards and a lender to what are termed 'sub-prime' customers, plunged $20.12 or 40% to $30.48 after regulators pressured the company to add $247m (£164m) to reserves to cover potential bad debts. Rival Household International eased $3.71 or 8% to $42.37.

Embattled conglomerate Tyco International slumped another 83 cents or 6.5% to $11.98 on continued worries about official investigations into its affairs.

IBM gained $1.68 or 2% to $70.69 in regular trading and then traded up to $72.47 in extended hours on release of its quarterly numbers.