YAHOO [BRIEFING.COM]: A pleasing payrolls report supported a positive tone among participants on the first anniversary of the "flash crash." Stocks responded by climbing more than 1%, but a loss of momentum left them to drift lower in afternoon trade.

The S&P 500 fell in each of this week's first four sessions for a cumulative loss of close to 2%, but buyers were brought back into the action by news that nonfarm payrolls climbed by 244,000 and private payrolls climbed by 268,000 during April. Economists polled by Briefing.com had expected, on average, respective increases of 185,000 and 200,000. Such a substantial increase overshadowed the headline unemployment rate, which came in at 9.0% to exceed the 8.8% consensus.

Broad buying interest helped the S&P 500 climb 1% to reclaim about half of what it had lost earlier this week, but buying interest began to wane by midday.
Energy stocks saw some of the most dramatic movement. Given that the sector had dropped almost 7% during the four previous sessions, many participants moved to grab bargains and, as a result, sent the sector more than 2% higher. Energy stocks failed to sustain that move, though; they finished with a gain of only 4%.

Part of the market's inability to preserve its gain stemmed from a lack of leadership. Industrial stocks (+0.8%) and materials stocks (+0.7%) finished as the top performers, but neither sector has much weight in the market. Despite that, stocks were able to settle with modest gains after the S&P 500 came in contact with the neutral line and then held above it.

Investors resumed their rotation into Treasuries as stocks surrendered their gains. Although buying in Treasuries wasn't robust, the yield on the benchmark 10--year Note eased to a new 2011 low of about 3.14%.

The dollar continued to attract interest as well. Its 1.0% advance made for an impressive follow up to the 1.4% spike that it staged in the prior session. Together they made for the greenback's best performance in months. While the dollar's advance in the prior session was helped by cautious commentary about monetary policy from the European Central Bank, today's gain was helped along by reports that Greece may be considering defecting from the eurozone.

Commodities continued to come under pressure, with few exceptions. General weakness in the complex took the CRB Commodity Index down to a 1.1% loss, which fed into a 9.0% drop for this week. Silver and oil had especially poor performances -- crude oil prices finished the week at $97.55 per barrel for a 14% weekly loss while silver prices plummeted 27% this week to $35.52 per ounce.

Advancing Sectors: Industrials (+0.8%), Materials (+0.7%), Health Care (+0.6%), Utilities (+0.5%), Energy (+0.4%), Financials (+0.3%), Tech (+0.3%), Telecom (+0.2%), Consumer Staples (+0.2%)

Commodities had another volatile session that concluded with crude oil prices down $2.25 to $97.55 per barrel after they had traded near the neutral line for a time. Natural gas prices fell about $0.03 to close at $4.30. Silver prices extended their slide to close with a $0.78 loss at $35.52 per ounce. June gold actually gained $12.40 to finish at $1494 per ounce, despite a stronger dollar.

Unchanged: Consumer Discretionary
Declining Sectors: (None)DJ30 +54.57 NASDAQ +12.84 NQ100 +0.3% R2K +0.5% SP400 +0.3% SP500 +5.10 NASDAQ Adv/Vol/Dec 1537/2.05 bln/1006 NYSE Adv/Vol/Dec 1990/1.03 bln/997