Dow Regains 49 but Still Off 111 for Week

Wall Street stocks closed sharply higher today, but the index still showed a huge loss for the week.

The Dow Jones average of 30 industrials, which had fallen 173.02 points over the three previous sessions, climbed 49.51 to 2,532.92.

The average finished the week with a net loss of 111.88 points.

But in the broader market, the situation was less rosy, with advancing stocks leading decliners by a moderate 3-2 margin. Volume was a heavy 201 million shares.

Wall Street analysts said the market gained from a steep fall in crude oil prices, with oil down more than $1 a barrel, as well as bargain-hunting after the losses earlier in the week.

Stock prices also rebounded in Tokyo, London and Frankfurt, West Germany, even as tensions intensified over Iraq’s deployment of troops near foreign embassies in occupied Kuwait.

Prices rose in Tokyo after fluctuations influenced by reports that elite Iraqi invasion forces in Kuwait were being replaced by second- and third-string troops.

The Nikkei Stock Average closed up 428.13 points at 24,165.76, a 1.8% rise, on the Tokyo Stock Exchange. The index lost 1,473.28 points Thursday, its fourth-largest one-day drop.

Share prices on London’s stock exchange were higher for the first time in seven trading days.

At the close, the Financial Times Stock Exchange 100-share index was 2,086.4, up 11.4 points, or 0.55%. The narrower Financial Times 30-share index was up 12.6 points at 1,616.8. The Financial Times 500 index was up 4.19 at 1,120.46.

Oil prices were knocked lower today as the market paused from its staggering three-week rally for a bout of profit-taking.

“This market’s been going straight up for so long and it tends to overextend itself. Some people are also selling on the prospect of an OPEC meeting,” said one trader. But most analysts said OPEC ministers meeting informally in Vienna Sunday will have problems agreeing on boosting output.

West Texas Intermediate, the U.S. benchmark, finished down a steep $1.02 at $30.91 a barrel for October delivery. New York unleaded gasoline for September ended down 3.89 cents at $1.0466 a gallon.

Traders say crude oil prices are poised for a violent jerk up to $50--or a crash to $20.

“We’re sitting on a rocket which could take us to the sky,” said one international oil trader.