Banks Butter Up Stocks

Checking in on commodities, oil futures fell 20 cents to$59.69 a barrel after falling more than $1 earlier in the day. Gold added $10 to $922.50 an ounce.

The dollar was recently stronger against the yen, but weaker vs. the pound and euro. Longer-dated Treasuries were falling in price, rising in yield. The 10-year was losing 14/32, to yield 3.35%, while the 30-year gave up 23/32, yielding 4.24%.

Stocks overseas were mixed. In Europe, London's FTSE 100 and the DAX in Frankfurt rose 1.8% and 3.2%, respectively. In Asia, the Nikkei in Japan and Hang Seng in Hong Kong each fell 2.6%.