Stocks soar on big shopping weekend

Associated Press

NEW YORK

A weekend of strong holiday shopping in the U.S. and radical proposals for stanching Europe’s debt crisis sent stocks soaring Monday. The Standard & Poor’s 500 index broke a seven-day losing streak and the Dow Jones industrial average jumped 291 points, its biggest gain in a month.

Markets in Europe also surged as leaders there discussed previously unthinkable approaches for containing the region’s debt troubles, such as joint bond sales and much tighter fiscal controls. France’s CAC-40 jumped 5.5 percent. Indexes in Germany and Italy rose 4.6 percent. The battered euro rose against the dollar.

European finance ministers discussed aggressive measures to stop the debt crisis from destroying the 17-nation currency union. In a sign of how desperate the situation has become, one proposal being discussed ahead of a financial summit Tuesday calls for having nations cede control over their budgets to a central European authority. Profligate borrowing and spending by Greece and other countries helped trigger the 2-year old crisis.

Another plan calls for Europe’s most stable economies such as Germany, France and Austria to jointly sell bonds to provide assistance to the region’s most indebted members.

Retail stocks, meanwhile, spiked after initial reports showed a record number of shoppers hit the mall or bought gifts online during the holiday weekend. Macy’s Inc. rose 4.7 percent and Best Buy Co. rose 3.4 percent. Thanksgiving weekend is a make-or-break time for many retailers. Black Friday is often the biggest retail sales day of the year.

The Dow soared 291.23 points, or 2.6 percent, to 11,523.01.

As the threat of an imminent meltdown in Europe ebbed, U.S. investors focused on a strong weekend of holiday shopping. A record 226 million shoppers visited stores and websites during the four-day holiday weekend, up from 212 million last year, according to early estimates by The National Retail Federation.