Wall Street advanced moderately Monday as a rising dollar cooled some concerns about inflation and helped keep oil prices in check.The dollar's gains against other major currencies appeared to help ease some concerns about inflation. A weak dollar can exacerbate price increases, especially since hard commodities like oil become more attractive to investors seeking a hedge against inflation. The market's unease about rising inflation and its effect on consumer spending receded somewhat as light, sweet crude wavered, falling 55 cents to $125.41 per barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange. Oil briefly reached a new trading high of $126.40, but investors seemed shy, for the time being at least, to add to oil's huge gain of nearly $10 last week. That advance added to concerns about rising prices and their effect on businesses and consumers.



The market also got some encouraging news about the credit crisis from London-based HSBC Holdings PLC, which said its first-quarter profits were up from a year ago although the global banking company took a $3.2 billion write-down on subprime mortgage assets in the United States. The company did echo other assessments that the U.S. was likely to fall into recession this year.

Monday's gains showed investors were still willing to lay some bets, although some market watchers said Wall Street will still likely see stocks fluctuate as investors try to determine the economy's direction. Monday's advance follows a week in which the major indexes all fell as worries about the impact of inflation weighed on investors.

"I think most of the action is behind us," said Ted Oberhaus, director of equity trading, Lord, Abbett & Co. LLC. "We've had a pretty good bull run that carried us up to about 1,400 on the S&P 500 and what we would expect is a little churning here," he said, predicting further back-and-forth trading.

In late morning trading, the Dow Jones industrial average rose 69.28, or 0.54 percent, to 12,815.16.

Broader stock indicators also rose. The Standard & Poor's 500 index advanced 5.90, or 0.42 percent, to 1,394.18, and the Nasdaq composite index rose 18.57, or 0.76 percent, to 2,464.09.

Bond prices rose. The yield on the benchmark 10-year Treasury note, which moves opposite its price, fell to 3.74 percent from 3.78 percent late Friday. The dollar was higher against most other major currencies, while gold prices fell.

Oberhaus said with the flow of first-quarter earnings reports beginning to dwindle, Wall Street would likely require some big news on the economy — such as a sharp reversal in commodities prices — to dislodge the markets from their current position.

"We're the majority of the way through the earnings season and it has been relatively productive. With that as a backdrop, I would expect a range-driven appreciation over the next few months," Oberhaus said.

In corporate news, FedEx Corp. rose 7 cents to $90.44 after lowering its fiscal fourth-quarter earnings forecast, citing rising fuel costs.

MBIA Inc. posted a $2.41 billion first-quarter loss, as the struggling bond insurer took heavy charges to write down the value of liabilities amid continued deterioration in the credit markets. The stock rose 82 cents, or 8.7 percent, to $10.25 following comments from the company on the strength of its balance sheet.

Research In Motion Ltd. rose $6.24, or 4.7 percent, to $139.01 ahead of the introduction of its first major new BlackBerry model in more than a year.

Investors will be looking to other readings on consumers this week to determine the toll rising energy costs might be having. Government figures are due on retail sales in April. And retailers including Wal-Mart Stores Inc., Macy's Inc., JCPenney Co. and Kohls Corp. are due to report first-quarter results.

Advancing issues outnumbered decliners by about 2 to 1 on the New York Stock Exchange, where volume came to 254.4 million shares.

The Russell 2000 index of smaller companies rose 7.06, or 0.98 percent, to 727.11.

Overseas, Japan's Nikkei stock average rose 0.64 percent. In afternoon trading, Britain's FTSE 100 was up 0.30 percent, Germany's DAX index rose 0.51 percent, and France's CAC-40 rose 0.15 percent.

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