YAHOO [BRIEFING.COM]: An improved tone abroad brought buyers back into the fold today. Support was unwavering.

News that a German court rejected a lawsuit to prevent Germany from participating in European Union bailouts helped several of Europe's bourses rally between 3% and 4% after they had suffered a series of steep losses that left them deep in bear market territory. The notion that Germany, Europe's most robust and diverse economy, is still at the lending table also triggered support for the euro, which worked its way to $1.410 for a 0.7% gain against the greenback.

Renewed confidence in Europe compelled domestic participants to switch on the risk trade after they had sent the stock market lower in three straight sessions for a cumulative loss of more than 4%. The S&P 500 bounced back by staging a steady advance to settle at its session high with a gain of almost 3%. Small-caps and mid-caps staged more stronger performances.

Financials collectively spiked almost 5%. They were the best performing sector this session, but only after they had underperformed in each of the past three trading days, during which time the sector surrendered about 8% of its market value.

Bank of America (BAC 7.48, +0.49) was a top performer in the sector after it announced plans to streamline its management and create a co-chief operating officer role.

Yahoo! (YHOO 13.61, +0.70) also announced changes to its management. The company's CFO will take over the role of CEO. That announcement, along with broad market support, made YHOO one of the better performing names of the day.

Fellow Nasdaq component NVIDIA (NVDA 14.25, +1.07) staged an even more impressive move. The stock's move toward its monthly high came in the wake of a pleasing revenue forecast for fiscal 2013.

A sharp rally in global equity indices pressured precious metals today, with Dec gold shedding 2.9% to close at $1817.60 per ounce, while Dec silver lost 0.6% to end at $41.63 per ounce. With investors returning, at least momentarily, to equities gold futures traded in close to a 100 point range from its electronic highs ($1883.20) to its intraday lows ($1793.80). Silver futures traded to their lowest levels in intraday trade but managed to rally of those lows to recoup a majority of losses.

The strength in equities supported the rally in Oct crude oil, which settled higher by 3.9% to $89.34 per barrel -its largest percentage gain in a month. Adding additional support was a new weather system developing out in the Bay of Campeche in Mexico. Futures traded to their best levels since the beginning of the month after notching highs at $89.79 in late morning trade. Oct natural gas, which finished near unchanged at $3.94 per MMBtu, also rallied on reports of the storm. However, heading into the close of pit trade futures gave back those gains to finish near flat on the day.

Advancing Sectors: Financials +4.8%, Energy +3.7%, Industrials +3.1%, Tech +2.7%, Materials +2.7%, Consumer Discretionary +2.6%, Health Care +2.4%, Consumer Staples +1.6%, Telecom +1.2%, Utilities +1.0%
Declining Sectors: (None)DJ30 +275.56 NASDAQ +75.11 NQ100 +2.6% R2K +4.2% SP400 +3.8% SP500 +33.38 NASDAQ Adv/Vol/Dec 2207/1.78 bln/391 NYSE Adv/Vol/Dec 2738/954 mln/315