Mid-Day Market Update: US Stocks Continue Rally, Large Cap Banks See Biggest Advances

Midway through trading Tuesday, the Dow was up 0.56 percent to 15,175.60, while the NASDAQ rose 0.64 percent to 3,460.81. The S&P was also up, rising 0.82 percent to 1,647.13. Top Headline
Stocks continued their rally on Tuesday, with the Dow and S&P 500 hitting new intraday highs as investors expected the upward trend to continue. Broad gains were witnessed, with over two-thirds of the NYSE listed companies rising. Large-cap banks saw the largest advances, with shares of Bank of America Corporation BAC rising 2.3 percent to $13.27, Citigroup C surging 2.1 percent to $49.97 and Goldman Sachs Group Inc GS up 2.9 percent to $153.97. Wall Street has seen upward movement for the past three straight weeks, up more than 14 percent so far this year, driven by better-than-estimated earnings reported by some companies and the Fed's easy monetary policy aimed at stimulating the economy. Equities Trading UP
SodaStream International Ltd SODA shot up 15.13 percent to $65.96. SodaStream reported its first quarter earnings and revenues significantly above the analyst estimates. ITT Educational Services Inc ESI got a boost, shooting up 13.75 percent to $24.24. ITT Educational Services' trailing twelve month operating margin is 22.81%. Stratasys Ltd SYSS was also up, gaining 9.80 percent to $93.71, after Stratsys reported its adjusted profit for the first quarter above the Wall Street estimates. Equities Trading DOWN
Opexa Therapeutics, Inc OPXA was down, falling 17.89 percent to $1.79. Opexa Therapeutics reported revenues of $220,100 for the first quarter, ended March 31, 2013. Velti Plc VELT was down 11.83 percent to $1.76 after Velti issued weak revenue expectations for the second quarter. MoSys, Inc MOSY shares tumbled 9.38 percent to 4.25. MoSys had priced its underwritten public offering of 6.5 million shares at $4.00 per share. Commodities
In commodity news, oil traded down 0.13 percent to $95.05, and gold declined 0.45 percent to $1,427.90. Silver traded also fell, declining 0.1.23 percent Monday to $23.41, while copper declined 2.10 percent to $3.29. Euro zone
European shares were mostly lower following the mixed economic data. The Spanish Ibex Index fell 0.6 percent and the Italian FTSE MIB Index declined 0.22 percent. Meanwhile, the German DAX declined 0.21 percent and the French CAC 40 lost 0.43 percent while U.K. shares fell 0.1 percent. Economics
Redbook reported a rise in chain store sales for the previous week, with a 2.8 percent y/y increase, representing a five-tenths rise from the week ago level. This upward movement contrasts the slowing to 1.2 percent in same store sales reported by ICSC-Goldman Tuesday morning. The 4-Week Bill Auction saw low offering sizes, which helped boost coverage at the US Treasury bill auctions. Tuesday coverage of $20 billion 4-week auction stood at 5.08, down from the 5.42 witnessed last week but up from the below-5 coverage seen at recent auctions where the offering sizes ranged from $30 to $45 billion.