YAHOO [BRIEFING.COM]: Strong, broad-based buying amid hope that Ireland will accept financial aid boosted stocks today, but failure to push through resistance caused stocks to stagger a little bit into the close.

Despite the tenuous state of finances in Ireland, the country's officials have insisted in recent days that they do not need aid. However, reports have suggested that representatives have taken on a more open tone ahead of scheduled talks with the European Union, European Central Bank, and International Monetary Fund. The indication that Ireland is open to funding has helped calm contagion concerns, though troubles linger for the rest of the PIGS contingent.

With global participants feeling more secure and accepting of risk, Europe's bourses bounced big. That helped perpetuate a positive tone set overnight by Asia's major averages, which got some relief from the steep slides endured amid speculation about actions to stem inflation in recent sessions.

The rotation back into stocks left the dollar to drop about 0.5% and boost some 90% of the issues in the S&P 500 to a gain. Natural resource plays like energy (+2.2%) and materials (+1.9%) attracted the most support. Stocks still failed to generate the momentum necessary to take the S&P 500 back above 1200, however. The benchmark index spent most of the session hugging the psychologically significant line before wavering a bit into the close. Stocks still finished with their best gain in two weeks, though.

Trading volume was heaviest in shares of General Motors (GM 34.24, +1.24), which returned to the NYSE for the first time in more than a year following its post-restructuring initial public offering. GM garnered an IPO price of $33 per share, but the stock opened trade at about $35 per share before it pulled back.

Action surrounding shares of GM helped bolster broader market share volume, such that 1.21 billion shares traded hands on the NYSE today. Average volume for the past 50 sessions stands at 1.04 billion shares.

There were a few doses of data today, but the latest Philly Fed Index was the only item to actually induce a positive response among participants. The Philadelphia Fed Index for November improved to 22.5 from 1.0 in October. Economists polled by Briefing.com had expected the reading to improve to just 5.0.

Leading Economic Indicators for October increased 0.5%, which is a bit less than the 0.6% increase that had been widely expected after a 0.5% increase in the prior month.

Initial jobless claims for the week ended November 13 totaled 439,000, down 2,000 week-over-week. That is not a surprise since 442,000 initial claims had been expected, on average, among economists surveyed by Briefing.com. Meanwhile, continuing claims fell to a near two-year low just below 4.30 million, which is down from the 4.34 million recorded for the prior week.

A weak dollar sparked a broad based rally in commodities today as every group closed the session in positive territory. Soft commodities (+3.7%) and precious metals (+3.4%) led the way higher. March sugar futures rallied for 6.4%, the most in 6 weeks, to settle at $0.2815 per pound. Supply concerns in India supported prices.

 Dec gold rallied for 1.2% to settle at $1352.00 per ounce, while Dec silver surged 5.5% to end at $26.83 per ounce. Both metals traded to the session highs in afternoon trade as the dollar tracked back towards its lows.

Dec crude oil finished higher by 1.8% to $81.85 per barrel. It too moved higher on the weaker dollar. It put in highs at $82.35 but pulled back from those levels in afternoon trade. Dec natural gas finished lower by 0.1% to $4.00 per MMBtu. This morning's inventory data pushed natural gas prices to its lows of the session, but it managed to bounce off those lows throughout the session to recoup almost all of its losses.

Advancing Sectors: Energy (+2.2%), Materials (+1.9%), Industrials (+1.8%), Tech (+1.8%), Telecom (+1.5%), Financials (+1.4%), Health Care (+1.3%), Consumer Staples (+1.3%), Consumer Discretionary (+0.9%), Utilities (+0.6%)
Declining Sectors: (None)DJ30 +173.35 NASDAQ +38.39 NQ100 +1.7% R2K +1.9% SP400 +1.4% SP500 +18.10 NASDAQ Adv/Vol/Dec 1979/2.06 bln/662 NYSE Adv/Vol/Dec 2448/1.21 bln/568