Stocks posted the sixth consecutive weekly gain, with the Dow Jones Industrial flirting with 11,000. We had good jobs report and better than expected same store sales that signaled that the U.S. economy is recovering. Treasuries had a strong week on interest rate outlook and auction demand.

March jobs report released on Friday showed the biggest increase in job creation in 3 years, as employers added 162,000 jobs!

Energy and commodity related shares led the way as the Dollar weakened versus the euro, as Greece’s debt worries eased and European confidence in the economic outlook improved to the highest in almost two years in March, beating economists’ forecasts and signaling the recovery is gathering strength.

Commodity traders are smiling happily because of the rally in gold, copper and aluminum prices. Gold rose to the highest price in four weeks and copper climbed to a 20-month high.

Stock market’s outlook looks brighter for the coming week. Earnings season starts on Monday. Dow is flirting with 11,000 psychological level for the first time since September 2008. Earnings from the following companies will decide the direction for the market. All these companies are scheduled to announce earnings in the next two weeks.

• Infosys Technologies on April 13th

• JP Morgan Chase on April 14th

• Intutive Surgical on April 15th

• Google on April 15th

• General Electric on April 16th

• Bank of America on April 16th

• Citibank on April 19th

• Goldman Sachs, Yahoo and Apple on April 20th

• Microsoft on April 22nd

U.S. Real Estate market continues to give mixed signals. The data from Commerce Department indicates that new home sales climbed for the fifth straight month in August as sharply lower prices lured buyers into the market. However, the National Association of Realtors reported that the demand for used homes fell unexpectedly in that month from July, the first decline after four months of increases. As always, it all depends on where you want to buy. Some markets (such as Las Vegas) in U.S. are still going down. Some markets (such as Seattle) are stabilizing. Expiration of first time buyers credit in November 2009 may be motivating buyers now. This uptrend may not continue after November if the employment situation doesn’t get any better.

There are continuing positive signals in stock market. We mentioned about pickup in Mergers & Activities few days ago. The return of Mergers on Monday lifted U.S. stocks to their highest levels in five weeks as major acquisition announcements from Abbot Laboratories and Xerox boosted investor hope. We are entering October in few days. I think that U.S. stock market will slow down in October before picking up the momentum in November.

Related Link: U.S. Home Prices Up