Big Rally Sweeps Wall Street

More volatility swept the U.S. equity markets on Monday, but this time it was to the upside. On Sunday evening, S&P 500 futures were indicating that stocks would fall precipitously the following day with the S&P touching the 1,115 level. All of those losses, however, were wiped out by the time the cash market opened and stocks closed strongly higher by the afternoon close. The Dow Jones Industrial Average gained 272 points to finish at 11,043. The widely watched blue-chip index traded in a range between 10,771 and 11,057. The S&P 500 ETF

jumped 2.38% to $116.24. Volume was on the light side with around 257 million SPY shares trading hands compared to a 3-month daily average of 292 million. The PowerShares QQQ Trust ETF

, which tracks the performance of the Nasdaq 100, added 1.16% to $54.78. The QQQ has gained 0.59% year-to-date. Crude oil rallied along with stocks. NYMEX crude futures gained 1.79% to $81.28. Spot Brent prices added 0.53% to $107.21. The United States Oil Fund ETF

added 1.22% on the New York Stock Exchange. Gold continued its slide, but rebounded strongly from its worst levels overnight on Sunday. COMEX gold futures shed 0.87% to $1,625.50. The SPDR Gold Trust ETF

lost 1.39% to close at $157.58. COMEX silver futures are currently trading at $30.80 after hitting a low of $26.15 on Sunday night. Treasuries fell on Monday as risk appetite came back into the market. The iShares Barclays 20+ Year Treasury Bond ETF

lost 1.65% to $118.84. The yield on the 10-Year Note rose 6.9 basis points to 1.90%. The U.S. Dollar fell slightly on the day. The PowerShares DB US Dollar Index Bullish ETF

, which tracks the performance of the greenback versus a basket of foreign currencies, lost 0.09% to $22.18. The closely watched EUR/USD pair is currently trading at $1.3520.