YAHOO [BRIEFING.COM]: The latest round of earnings announcements and strong results from European bank stress tests were met with a muted response by market participants. However, an afternoon bounce by the euro helped bring about a broad-based bid that drove the major averages above some key hurdles.

Better-than-expected bottom lines from Dow components American Express (AXP 44.76, +1.57), McDonalds (MCD 69.90, -1.50), Microsoft (MSFT 25.81, -0.03), and Verizon (VZ 28.02, +1.02) did little to lift the overall mood of the market participants this morning. Fellow Dow component General Electric (GE 15.71, +0.50) announced after the open that it will hike its quarterly dividend by 20% to $0.12 per share, but that also failed to stir any kind of fanfare.

Among the more widely-held names to report, Amazon.com (AMZN 118.87, -1.20) was the only one that came short of the consensus estimate. A knee jerk selling effort caused its shares to open near nine-month lows, but they were able to pare losses with help from a broad-based bid in the afternoon.

Buyers emerged in the afternoon to drive the Dow and Nasdaq Composite above their respective 200-day averages for the first time in one month. The S&P 500 remained well below its 200-day average, but it did make its way above the 1100 line, which has been a point of formidable resistance in recent weeks.

The afternoon advance came amid a rebound by the euro, which had a modest lead over the dollar in the early going, then fell so that it was down as much as 0.8%, but ultimately settled with a minimal gain.

The whipsaw action in the euro came in conjunction with the results of stress tests on European banks. Of the 91 that were assessed, only seven failed. Spain's Espiga Savings Bank and Germany's Hypo Real Estate were among the few that failed.

It was a relatively quiet session for the CRB Commodity Index, as it finished lower by 0.1%. Groups in the index were mixed, with 3 advancers and 3 decliners. Industrials led the way higher with a 1.9% gain, while energy shed 0.8%.

Sept crude oil futures finished lower by 0.3% to $78.98 per barrel. It was modestly lower heading into the afternoon session, but pushed back towards the flat line with the help of an intraday rally in the equity markets. It did pull back below the $79 level just ahead of the close to finish lower on the day. Aug natural gas futures finished lower by 1.5% to $4.582 per MMBtu.

It was another quiet day for Aug gold, which settled lower by 0.6% to $1187.80 per ounce, and Sept silver, which ended down 0.1% to $18.101. Both precious metals spent the afternoon chopping around near their session lows.

Despite what would seem like a strong outcome to the bank examinations, market participants were generally unfazed by the midday announcement. That's largely because the stringency of the tests was unclear and the tests didn't really do anything to address concerns about the pace of the economic recovery following the testimony of Fed Chairman Bernanke earlier this week. DJ30 +102.32 NASDAQ +23.58 SP500 +8.98 NASDAQ Adv/Vol/Dec 2022/2.40 bln/573 NYSE Adv/Vol/Dec 2411/1.14 bln/602