NEW YORK — It took a while, but the Dow Jones industrial average finally gained back all its losses for the month.
On a day of conflicting signals, as investors weighed disappointing economic news against reports of higher profits at big companies, stocks inched higher. All three major indexes were up Friday, though barely.
The Dow climbed 23.69 points to 13,228.31, a tiny 0.2 percent gain. That was enough to push the index into the black for April. It’s now 16 points higher than where it began the month.
The Standard & Poor’s 500 edged up 3.38 points, or 0.2 percent, to 1,403.36. The Nasdaq rose 18.59 points, or 0.6 percent, to 3,069.20.
Amazon jumped 16 percent after the online retailer reported a big increase in shipments. Online travel agency Expedia surged 24 percent on higher profits from its hotel-booking business.
Companies in the S&P 500 are now on track to report a 6 percent rise in earnings for the first three months of 2012, compared with a year ago, according to FactSet, a financial data provider. Last month, Wall Street analysts had expected earnings this quarter to be flat.
The stock gains Friday came despite a government report earlier in the day that the U.S. economy grew at an annual rate of 2.2 percent, below the 2.5 percent that economists had expected. It grew at a faster rate, 3 percent, in the final three months of 2011.
