By Lewis Krauskopf
NEW YORK (Reuters) - U.S. stocks gained on Friday, and the benchmark S&P index flirted with its best weekly performance this year, as comments from Europe's central bank that it was ready to act quickly to boost inflation lift sentiment in equities markets and weakened the euro against the dollar.
A broad index of European stocks nudged higher after the head of the European Central Bank, Mario Draghi, offered the strongest hint yet that the ECB will unveil fresh stimulus measures at its Dec. 3 meeting.
The S&P 500 index was nearing the 3.26 percent increase it marked in the week ended Oct 9, its best weekly rise for 2015, as U.S. stocks bounced back from last week's steep decline.
"Any siren call from a central bank, particularly a systemically important one, about more largesse on the part of that central bank's balance sheet to try to reflate economic activity is sort of a cause and effect for why financial assets then accompany in that rally," said Mark Luschini, chief investment strategist at Janney Montgomery Scott in Philadelphia.
Investors in recent days have also increasingly come to expect that the U.S. Federal Reserve will raise interest rates next month, which would be the first rate increase in almost a decade.
"It's setting in that even if the Fed does hike in December and increase gradually, they're not going to get on a sustained path of hikes," said Justin Hoogendoorn, head of fixed income strategy at Piper Jaffray in Chicago.
The Dow Jones industrial average <.DJI> rose 84.85 points, or 0.48 percent, to 17,817.6, the S&P 500 <.SPX> gained 7.85 points, or 0.38 percent, to 2,089.09, and the Nasdaq Composite <.IXIC> added 27.60 points, or 0.54 percent, to 5,101.24.
Nike
The pan-European FTSEurofirst 300 index <.FTEU3> climbed 0.2 percent, near three-month highs, as it tallied its best weekly performance in a month. Germany's DAX index <.GDAXI> gained 0.3 percent, leading the continent's other major national indexes, helped by a 2.5 percent rise in Volkswagen
An index of significant global markets <.MIWD00000PUS> rose 0.2 percent.
At a press conference in Frankfurt, Draghi addressed the ECB's considerations at it upcoming meeting on Dec. 3: "If we decide that the current trajectory of our policy is not sufficient to achieve our objective, we will do what we must to raise inflation as quickly as possible."
The comments put pressure on the euro >, which fell against the dollar after two days of gains. The euro was off 0.8 percent and slipped below $1.07.
"With the ECB easing policy, I would be very surprised if the euro didn't fall through parity," Mark Burgess, chief investment officer at Columbia Threadneedle Investments, told the Reuters Global Investment Outlook Summit on Friday.
The dollar <.DXY> rose 0.6 percent against a basket of currencies, resuming its march upward over the past month.
Prices of benchmark 10-year U.S. Treasuries > fell 4/32 for a yield of 2.2588 percent.
Oil prices rose as short covering helped overcome the stronger dollar, which pressures commodities denominated in the greenback.
Brent crude
Zinc prices
(Reporting by Lewis Krauskopf; Additional reporting by Gertrude Chavez-Dreyfuss, Tariro Mzezewa, Barani Krishnan in New York, and Marc Jones, Libby George and Patrick Graham in London; Editing by Nick Zieminski and Leslie Adler)
