Dow Rises for Third Straight Day

NEW YORK (TheStreet) -- U.S. stocks finished with modest gains Tuesday after a Federal Reserve official called for an aggressive asset purchase program.

Investor sentiment also got a lift from chatter about a coordinated bond-buying action in Europe and easing concerns about the Chinese economy.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average closed up 51 points, or 0.39%, at 13,169. At its session-high of 13,216, the blue-chip index was within 125 points of its 2012 intraday high of 13,338 on May 1.

Within the Dow, 21 of 30 components were in the green, led by Boeing(BA) , Cisco(CSCO) , JPMorgan(JPM) and United Technologies(UTX) .

The biggest percentage decliners among the blue chips were Coca-Cola(KO) , Johnson & Johnson(JNJ) , Merck(MRK) and Pfizer(PFE) .

Pfizer and J&J were under pressure after the drug giants discontinued development of a highly anticipated experimental treatment for Alzheimer's disease after the drug failed to achieve key goals in a late stage clinical trial.

The S&P 500 rose 7 points, or 0.51%, to finish at 1401, settling above 1400 for the first time in three months and moving within 2% of its four-year high.

The Nasdaq Composite surged 26 points, or 0.87%, to finish at 3016. It was the index's first close above 3000 since May 3.

All three major U.S. equity indices rose for a third straight session.

In the broad market, the consumer cyclicals, energy and capital goods sectors fared best while utilities, health care and consumer non-cyclicals ticked lower.

Winners outpaced losers by a roughly 2-to-1 ratio on both the New York Stock Exchange and Nasdaq. Volume totaled 3.67 billion on the Big Board and 1.89 billion on the Nasdaq.

Buyers keyed off comments from Eric Rosengren, president of the Federal Reserve Bank of Boston, who said in an interview with The Wall Street Journal that the Fed should launch an aggressive, open-ended bond buying program that would continue until economic growth picks up and unemployment starts falling again.