YAHOO [BRIEFING.COM]: Stocks scored their third straight advance today. The broad market is now up roughly 3% for the week.

An improved tone of trade this week has helped stocks win support in the face of ongoing protests in the streets of Athens, Greece. The social tumult continued today while the country's parliament passed a new austerity plan intended to shore up the Greece's finances. A vote on the implementation of the plan is expected tomorrow.

The austerity plan's acceptance by Greece's parliament wasn't a surprise. It was actually followed with a mild sell-the-news type of response before stocks stabilized and began to make an upward push.

Some afternoon selling threatened to slash the stock market's gain, but leadership from the financial sector helped drive a broader rebound. Although the sector had already been outperforming, Visa (V 86.57, +11.29) and MasterCard (MA 309.70, +31.47) emerged late in the session to help take financials a leg higher. Their surge came in response to the final rule on the Durbin Amendment, which saw its interchange cap increased by the Fed. Financials ended the day with a 2.2% gain.

Monsanto (MON 70.26, +3.36) was also a strong performer this session. The stock's upside earnings surprise and guidance helped drive basic materials stocks to a collective gain of 1.5%.

The latest quarterly report from General Mills (GIS 37.38, +0.17) was more lackluster. It featured in-line earnings and downside guidance. However, the company increased its quarterly dividend by 9% to $0.305 per share.

Commodities also performed well this session. Buying was bolstered by a weaker dollar, which was hampered amid an improved view of the goings on in Greece. Among precious metals, gold gained 0.7% to close at $1510.60 per ounce. Silver surged 3.5% to settle at $34.80 per ounce. As for oil, it advanced 2% to $94.77 per barrel with help from some bullish inventory data. Oil had been as high as $95.84 per barrel, which marked a 10-session best.

Treasuries were trampled again. Their weakness was mostly owed to favor for the relative risk of equities, but another display of dismal demand at the latest Treasury auction also drove selling. The auction of 7-year Notes drew a bid-to-cover ratio of 2.62, dollar demand of $76.0 billion, and an indirect bidder participation rate of 32.2%. Each statistic was well below the six-auction average.

Data was limited to the latest pending home sales report. Although pending home sales increased by 8.2% in May, rather than decline by 0.6% as had been expected among economists surveyed by Briefing.com, there wasn't much of a response to the report.

Focus in the commodities markets was largely based around this morning's austerity vote in Greece, which passed. The anticipation of that the vote passing sent the euro higher and the dollar lower, which boded well for commodities like gold, silver and crude oil... Metals: August gold rallied for 0.7% to close at $1510.60 per ounce, while July silver surged 3.5% to end at $34.80 per ounce. Gold rallied to its session highs at $1513.80 in late morning trade, but pulled back from those levels into the close. Silver traded to its session highs, at $34.91, in afternoon trade and also pulled back heading into the close.

Weakness in the dollar, coupled with bullish inventory data, sent August crude oil, which settled higher by 2% to $94.77 per barrel, to its highest levels in 10 sessions at $95.84. Futures did pullback below the $95 level heading into the close of pit trade. August natural gas finished lower by 0.9% to $4.32.

Advancing Sectors: Financials +2.1%, Materials +1.5%, Energy +1.1%, Tech +0.8%, Telecom +0.6%, Industrials +0.5%, Utilities +0.4%, Consumer Discretionary +0.4%, Consumer Staples +0.4%, Health Care +0.1%
Declining Sectors: (None)DJ30 +72.73 NASDAQ +11.18 NQ100 +0.4% R2K +0.3% SP400 +0.8% SP500 +10.74 NASDAQ Adv/Vol/Dec 1271/1.81 bln/1089 NYSE Adv/Vol/Dec 2092/912 mln/905