Stock market tileA strong pickup in hiring last month lifted the stock market early Friday, pushing the Standard and Poor’s 500 index above 1,600 points for the first time.
In the first half-hour of trading, the S&P 500 index surged 18 points, or 1.1 percent, to 1,615. It has been thirteen years since the broad stock-market index broke through 1,500.
The Dow Jones industrial average soared closer to a milestone of its own: 15,000 points. The Dow jumped 153 points to 14,982, a gain of 1 percent.
The government said U.S. employers added 165,000 jobs in April, more than economists were expecting. It also said more jobs were created in February and March than it had estimated earlier.
The unemployment rate also fell to 7.5 percent, the lowest in four years, from 7.6 percent the month before.