US STOCKS-Wall St leaps on bank optimism, jobs data

                                
 * Banks rise after stress test results
                                
 * Job data boosts optimism on economy; energy shares up
                                
 * Dow up 2 pct; S&P 500 up 2.4 pct; Nasdaq up 1.3 pct
                                
 * For up-to-the-minute market news click [STXNEWS/US]
 (Adds volume figures in last two paragraphs)
                                
 By Ellis Mnyandu
                                
 NEW YORK, May 8 (Reuters) - U.S. stocks rose on Friday,
and the Nasdaq capped its longest stretch of weekly gains in a
decade as stress test results and reassuring jobs data fueled
hopes the worst is over for banks and the economy.
                                
 Financial shares led a broad run-up again, a day after
regulators said most U.S. banks were sound. The KBW Bank index
<.BKX> surged 12.1 percent.
                                
 Shares of No. 2 U.S. bank JPMorgan Chase Inc <JPM.N>
climbed 10.5 percent to $38.94, making the stock the Dow's top
gainer. A 3.4 percent gain in oil prices above $58 a barrel
bolstered energy companies' shares, led by Chevron Corp
<CVX.N>, which rose 3.5 percent to $70.38.
                                
 The release of the stress test results "has given people a
little bit of confidence that the government can help to solve
this part of the financial crisis," said Richard Sparks,
senior equities analyst and options trader at Schaeffer's
Investment Research in Cincinnati.
                                
 "There's a sense that the government actually has a
logical plan ... even if things got worse, these companies
will be able to survive. That helps bolster confidence in the
administration."
                                
 The Dow Jones industrial average <.DJI> gained 164.80
points, or 1.96 percent, to 8,574.65. The Standard & Poor's
500 Index <.SPX> rose 21.84 points, or 2.41 percent, to
929.23. The Nasdaq Composite Index <.IXIC> climbed 22.76
points, or 1.33 percent, to 1,739.00.
                                
 NASDAQ CLIMBS LIKE IT'S 1999
                                
 For the week, the Dow rose 4.4 percent and the S&P 500
gained 5.9 percent, while the Nasdaq jumped 1.2 percent.
                                
 The Nasdaq registered its ninth straight weekly advance,
the longest such streak for the index since an 11-week climb
in December 1999. Since hitting a 12-year closing low in
March, the S&P has surged 37.4 percent, but it is still down
40 percent from its record of October 2007.
                                
 Shares of Wells Fargo <WFC.N>  jumped 13.8 percent to
$28.18 and shares of Bank of America <BAC.N> , the largest
U.S. bank, gained 4.9 percent to $14.17, while Citigroup <C.N>
 climbed 5.5 percent to $4.02.
                                
 U.S. regulators told top banks after the close on Thursday
to raise $74.6 billion to build a capital cushion that
officials hope will restore faith in financial companies and
set a course out of the deepest recession in decades. For
details, see [ID:nN07333426]
                                
 Several of the large banks have announced equity and debt
offerings in an attempt to raise capital.
                                
 Bank of America Chief Executive Kenneth Lewis said in an
interview on CNBC he anticipates about $10 billion in asset
sales and that he is "pretty confident" the bank will do
better than the stress test results indicate. Regulators told
his bank it needed $33.9 billion of fresh capital.
                                
 The 539,000 jobs cut by employers in April was the
smallest reduction since October, and hinted at some
improvement in the labor market, but the unemployment rate
soared to 8.9 percent, the highest since September 1983.
[ID:nN07416806]
                                
 Web search leader Google Inc <GOOG.O>, up 2.7 percent at
$407.33, gave the Nasdaq its biggest boost, followed by
Activision Blizzard Inc <ATVI.O>, up 7.4 percent at $11.81.
                                
 Sanford C. Bernstein, a brokerage, raised its price target
on Google's stock to $600. Activision, the video-game maker,
posted quarterly results that topped Wall Street's estimates
and raised its 2009 forecast.
                                
 Hopes of an economic recovery pushed U.S. front-month
crude <CLc1> up $1.92, or 3.4 percent, to settle at $58.63 a
barrel, and gave investors a reason to buy energy shares.
Exxon Mobil <XOM.N> shares added 2.7 percent to $70.80.
                                
 Trading volume was active on the New York Stock Exchange,
with about 1.90 billion shares changing hands, above last
year's estimated daily average volume of 1.49 billion, while
on Nasdaq, about 3.18 billion shares traded, also well above
last year's daily average of 2.28 billion.
                                
 Advancing stocks outnumbered declining ones by 2,645 to
431 on the NYSE, and by 2,049 to 681 on Nasdaq.
  (Additional reporting by Chuck Mikolajczak; Editing by Jan
Paschal)