REUTERS/Brendan McDermid
In early trade on Friday the Dow was up 150 points, the S&P 500 was up 16 points, and the Nasdaq was up 42 points.
The rally in stocks comes at the end of what has been a choppy week for the market, with the action Wednesday, especially in the bond market, getting pretty volatile.
On Friday morning, we've gotten housing starts data that came in better than expected, and we're waiting on consumer confidence numbers from the University of Michigan and as well as existing home sales data.
US stocks are taking their lead from stocks in Europe, which are green across the board on Friday, lead by gains in Italy, Spain, and France, where stocks are climbing more than 2%.