NEW YORK — Stocks rallied Friday, posting strong weekly gains that sent the Dow industrials to three-month highs, as investors cheered Citigroup Inc.’s write-downs, which were not as bad as feared, as well as upbeat earnings from Internet-search giant Google Inc.
Strong results out of multinational industrial firms Caterpillar Inc. and Honeywell Inc. also helped to ease concerns about growth.
Crude-oil prices closed well above $116 a barrel and also fueled strong gains for the energy sector.
“The news out of Citigroup wasn’t terrific but (was) not as bad as expected,” said Paul Nolte, director of investments at Hinsdale Associates. “The market is looking at this as being halfway through, or maybe more than halfway through, the problems for financials.”
The Dow Jones industrial average gained 228.87 points, or 1.8 percent, to 12,849.36, topping its Feb. 1 intraday high of 12,841.
For the week, the Dow advanced 4.3 percent.
Banking giant Citigroup posted a first-quarter loss of $1.02 a share, worse than the loss of 95 cents expected by analysts, but its revenue exceeded expectations.
The firm also took write-downs and other losses totaling about $12 billion and reiterated a promise to continue divesting non-core assets.
Yet, its shares jumped 4.5 percent, with the market having already priced in a lot of the pain for the bank and for much of the ailing financial sector as a whole.
Citigroup’s advance followed solid gains scored Thursday by Merrill Lynch after it missed forecasts but said it remains well capitalized.
The S&P 500 index gained 24.77 points, or 1.8 percent, to end at 1,390.33, adding up to a 4.3 percent advance for the week. The Nasdaq Composite rose 61.14 points, or 2.6 percent, to 2,402.97, putting in a whopping 4.9 percent advance on the week.
Trading volumes showed 1.5 billion shares exchanging hands on the New York Stock Exchange, where gainers topped decliners by 4 to 1. On the Nasdaq, 989 million shares traded, with gainers topping decliners by 3 to 1.
The Dow also received strong support from upbeat results at equipment-maker Caterpillar Inc., which saw its shares jump 8.5 percent.
Away from the Dow, fellow industrial firm Honeywell Inc. rose 6.2 percent.
Google shares surged 20 percent after the Internet giant posted a 31 percent rise in first-quarter profit to $1.31 billion late Thursday and said growth in paid clicks — or the number of times users click on sponsored links — was much higher than recent speculation had suggested.
With little on the economic calendar, the dollar posted solid gains on the back of Citigroup’s results, adding 0.9 percent against a basket of major currencies.
Oil prices reversed morning losses lower, with the May-dated light-crude contract surging to a new record high of $116.69 a barrel amid supply disruptions in Nigeria. Crude then went on to trade at $117 a barrel in electronic trading.
