Business Highlights

In testimony before the panel, Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner defended the proposal as the nation's best shot. Lawmakers mostly agreed that change was needed to streamline federal regulation and fill in oversight gaps believed to have contributed to the housing and credit crisis.

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Financial, health care stocks pull market higher

NEW YORK (AP) — Stocks closed mostly higher but off their best levels Thursday following three straight days of losses. Investors piled back into financial and health care companies and moved out of industries like technology that had been leading the market.

Several upbeat economic reports encouraged investors after a slide earlier this week that dragged the benchmark Standard & Poor's 500 index down 3.8 percent.

The Dow Jones industrials rose 58.42, or 0.7 percent, to 8,555.60. The Dow had been up 98 points. The S&P 500 index rose 7.66, or 0.8 percent, to 918.37, while the Nasdaq composite index slipped 0.34, or less than 0.1 percent, to 1,807.72. With trading light as the summer slowdown begins, analysts say more volume is needed in order to move the market significantly in any one direction.