NEW YORK (MarketWatch) — U.S. stocks gained Wednesday, rebounding from an extended losing run after Spanish and Italian bond yields fell and aluminum maker Alcoa Inc. reported a surprising profit.

“The Alcoa report really helped key the rally. In general, the tone of the earnings season will be positive,” said Andrew Fitzpatrick, director of investments at Hinsdale Associates Inc. in Hinsdale, Ill.

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The market will keep a close watch on weekly jobless claims data Thursday morning.

“As long as it’s under 400,000, and shows not much of an increase from last week and last month, that will alleviate some concerns on the jobs front” that came with last week’s monthly jobs, which was likely a “one-time anomaly,” Fitzpatrick added.

On Wednesday, The Dow Jones Industrial Average DJIA, -0.47% rose 89.46 points, or 0.7%, to 12,805.3, halting a five-day losing streak, its longest since an eight-day run that ended Aug. 2, 2011.

Alcoa AA, -4.65% rallied the most among the index’s 30 components, up 6.2%.

The aluminum maker’s surprise profit “speaks to what is happening elsewhere,” such as in China and Brazil, said Frances Hudson, an Edinburgh-based strategist at Standard Life Investments. “The world might be moving into a sustainable recovery even if China’s growth is slowing.”

That said, “the market is not trading on high volumes or great convictions, so the things moving the market seem to be relatively flimsy. We’ve got a long way to go from Alcoa’s earnings figures to having the whole of the S&P 500 reporting,” she commented.

The S&P 500 Index SPX, -0.48% gained 10.12 points, or 0.7%, to 1,368.71, with financial firms leading and energy the poorest performeramong its 10 major industry groups.

The bar for first-quarter earnings results has been “set so low, it will be very difficult to not have upside earnings growth,” according to Art Hogan, a strategist at Lazard Capital Markets in New York, who points out that less than 30 of the S&P 500 pre-announced.

Just two S&P 500 sectors are expected to have positive earnings growth: technology and consumer staples, Hogan said.

The Nasdaq Composite COMP, -0.29% added 12.24 points, or 0.8%, to 3,016.46.

For every stock declining, roughly four rose on the New York Stock Exchange, where nearly 590 million shares traded. Composite volume topped 3.7 billion.

Crude moves

Oil prices scaled back gains a bit after the government reported U.S. supplies rose by 2.8 million barrels last week, with crude futures for May delivery CLK22, -2.40% rising 1.7% to end at $102.70 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange.

The Labor Department reported import prices rose 1.3% last month, with higher petroleum costs fueling the rise. Excluding food and energy, prices climbed more modestly.

The dollar DXY, +0.05% fell against other major currencies, including the euro EURUSD, -0.07% .

Investor sentiment also drew a lift after a European Central Bank official reportedly indicated the ECB could resume its bond-purchase program.

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Half a dozen European countries sold debt Wednesday, with Germany drawing bids for less than its maximum target and Italy matching its objective. Yields on Spanish and Italian 10-year debt declined.

“The biggest reason we’re up today is both Italian and Spanish debt spreads are coming back,” said Hogan at Lazard Capital Markets.

On Wednesday afternoon, the Federal Reserve said economic expansion continued from mid-February through late March in all 12 of its regions, with manufacturing, hiring and retail sales displaying strength.

Tuesday marked a fifth consecutive down day for the Dow industrials and S&P 500, with both indexes losing more than 4% during the extended slide that many considered long overdue.

“We had a shallow correction in a market that has been up in a straight line since the October lows,” noted Lazard’s Hogan, who chalks up the losing run to a “hangover from the volatile jobs number, weakening Chinese economic data and European debt spreads blowing out.”

A steady stream of positive U.S. economic reports raised expectations, eventually making the bar more difficult to cross, offered Hudson at Standard Life Investments. “The payrolls figure last Friday was just a reality check; you can’t expect uninterrupted upward trajectory in these things. We subscribe to the view that the recovery is taking hold and will become sustainable.”

Friday’s U.S. nonfarm payrolls report had only 120,000 jobs added in March, much below the 200,000-plus estimates offered by economists ahead of the data.

On Wednesday, Atlanta Fed President Dennis Lockhart said that while the March jobs report was a disappointment, he does not believe another round of asset purchases by the central bank would help much.