WALL STREET >>> Stocks Stay Red Hot on Earnings, Roubini

The Dow climbed almost 100 points Thursday and the Nasdaq Composite rallied for the seventh-straight day after JPMorgan Chase became the latest bellwether to crush earnings estimates and Nouriel “Dr. Doom” Roubini became the latest bear to sound like a bull.
Today’s Markets
The Dow Jones Industrial Average gained 95.61 points, or 1.11%, to 8711.82, the Standard & Poor's 500 gained 8.06 points, or 0.86%, to 940.74 and the Nasdaq Composite picked up 22.13 points, or 1.19%, to 1885.03. Fueled by a flurry of better-than-expected earnings reports, the Dow has soared 565 points this week and the Nasdaq Composite mounted its longest win streak since September 2006.

“Clearly the market is pricing in a sustainable rebound for the second half of the year,” said Peter Kenny, managing director at Knight Capital Markets. “I thought we would give some back on Tuesday and we didn’t. On Wednesday we took it to a whole other level. It’s very impressive.”

“The brand name stocks have somehow pulled a rabbit out of their hats, the banks particularly,” said Frank Davis, director of sales and trading. “It’s still very early. Come back Tuesday and we could be evaporating right back to 8000” on the Dow.

Days after bearish analyst Meredith Whitney helped fuel a triple-digit rally, Roubini gave the market a further boost by saying the worst of the economic and financial crisis is behind us. Roubini, who predicted much of the downturn, couched the statement by saying a second stimulus worth $200 billion to $250 billion may be necessary.

Despite the recent outbreak of optimism on Wall Street, some bears are still saying the rally has been built on sticks.
“I still think this is not real,” said Joe Saluzzi, co-head of trading at Themis Trading, pointing to low trading volume, high unemployment and CIT Group, the commercial lender that is said to be teetering on collapse. “There are a lot of problems out there. No one wants to recognize them.”

Stocks initially didn't receive much of a jolt from JPMorgan, which easily beat the Street with an adjusted-quarterly profit of $2.7 billion, or 28 cents a share. While the bank’s net revenue soared by 41%, it set aside more than twice as much as last year for bad loans and added another $2 billion to credit reserves. After surging in anticipation of the results on Wednesday, JPMorgan and the financial sector closed flat.

Meanwhile, Wall Street appeared to be mostly unfazed by the potential demise of CIT Group, underscoring the change in sentiment since the darkest days of the credit crisis. CIT's shares plummeted nearly 80% to new 52-week lows after talks over a government rescue fell apart overnight, increasing the chances CIT will need to file for bankruptcy.

In the commodity markets, crude oil built on its largest one-day gain since June 4. Erasing earlier declines, crude settled up 48 cents a barrel, or 0.78%, to $62.02.

Global Markets
European stocks rallied for the fourth-straight session. London's FTSE 100 gained 0.35% to 4361.84, France'sCAC 40 advanced 0.9% to 3199.68 and Germany's DAX rose 0.58% to 4957.19.
Asian markets closed with a mixed picture overnight as Japan's Nikkei 225 climbed 0.81% to 9344.16 and Hong Kong's Hang Seng rallied 0.57% to 18361.87 but China's Shanghai Composite fell 0.15% to 3183.74.