It's Thursday, the final trading day of an abbreviated trading week -- and it's starting to look like me might end this one on a high note. After back-to-back days of rising share prices, the S&P 500 index is up better than 2% here at the 12:50 p.m. EDT minute mark, the Dow Jones Industrial Average right there beside it, and the tech-heavy Nasdaq trailing -- but still up better than 1%.
Gains do appear to be concentrated among industrial and consumer goods stocks, however, with shares of motorcycle maker Harley-Davidson (NYSE: HOG) up 4.3% for example, used-car seller CarMax (NYSE: KMX) rising 7.5%, and aluminum giant Alcoa (NYSE: AA) gaining 6.9%.
Why?