国际英语新闻:Dow sees biggest gains in 7 months on robust jobs report

NEW YORK, Oct. 3 (Xinhua) -- U.S. stocks rallied on Friday, with the Dow Jones Industrial Average logging the largest daily gains in seven months, as better-than-expected U.S. nonfarm payrolls for September triggered investor euphoria.

The Dow surged 208.64 points, or 1.24 percent, to 17,009.69. The S&P 500 climbed 21.73 points, or 1.12 percent, to 1,967.90. The Nasdaq Composite Index jumped 45.43 points, or 1.03 percent, to 4,475.62.

Total nonfarm payroll employment added 248,000 in September, and the unemployment rate declined to 5.9 percent from 6.1 percent in August, the lowest level in over six years, said the Labor Department Friday. The latest figures beat market expectations.

"The continued rapid drop in the unemployment rate increases the odds that reaching the natural rate of unemployment and the first Fed rate hike will occur in the first half of 2015," said Gad Levanon, director of macroeconomic and labor market research at the Conference Board, a New York-based research group.

However, the rally still failed to wipe out all earlier losses in the week, as worries over global growth prospects and valuations of the U.S. stocks delivered a blow to Wall Street.

For the week, the Dow was down 0.6 percent, and the S&P 500 lost 0.8 percent while the Nasdaq fell 0.8 percent.

Among other data, U.S. trade deficit narrowed slightly in August to 40.1 billion U.S. dollars from the revised 40.3 billion dollars in July, the Commerce Department said Friday.

Additionally, a pair of reports released Friday signaled that U. S. non-manufacturing sector continued to expand strongly in September.

The seasonally adjusted final Markit U.S. services business activity index stood at 58.9 in September, down from 59.5 in August, but still well above 50, the dividing line between expansion and contraction. The figure indicated a further sharp expansion of overall business activity across the service sector.

A separate report by the Institute for Supply Management showed that the non-manufacturing index registered 58.6 in September, lower than the August reading of 59.6, but still representing continued growth in the non-manufacturing sector.

In corporate news, J.P. Morgan Chase & Co. said Thursday in a filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission that a cyber attack on the bank this summer compromised information of 76 million households and seven million small businesses.

J.P. Morgan's data breach, one of the largest in history, followed a number of such incidents among U.S. retailers, including discount retailer Target, home improvement retailer Home Depot and luxury retail chain Neiman Marcus.

The CBOE Volatility Index, often referred to as Wall Street's fear gauge, plunged 9.96 percent to end at 14.55 on Friday.

In other markets, crude price tumbled Friday on expectations of the global supply glut. Light, sweet crude for November delivery moved down 1.27 dollars to 89.74 dollars a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange, while Brent crude for November delivery lost 1.11 dollars to 92.31 dollars a barrel.

Gold futures on the COMEX division of the New York Mercantile Exchange Friday plummeted below 1,200 dollars in its lowest level since February 2010. The most active gold contract for December delivery was down 22.2 dollars, or 1.83 percent, to settle at 1, 192.9 dollars per ounce.

The U.S. dollar rallied across the board Friday as the positive jobs data boosted market speculations about an earlier-than- expected rate hike.

In late New York trading, the euro slipped to 1.2511 dollars from 1.2674 dollars in the previous session, and the dollar bought 109.84 Japanese yen, higher than 108.41 yen of the previous session.