Gain In Home Sales Lifts Markets To Sharply Higher Close

Existing home sales climbed in March to lift the markets to a sharply higher close with the Dow surging 186 points to 12,453. Nasdaq soared 57 points to 2802.

On the upside

A federal appeals court upheld a ruling in favor of TiVo (Nasdaq: TIVO) and affirmed that Dish Network (Nasdaq: DISH) infringed on TiVo's patents.

Shares of Sagent Pharmaceuticals (Nasdaq: SGNT) surged on its first trading day.

Polaris Industries (NYSE: PII) reported first quarter earnings that more than doubled to surpass analyst expectations by a wide margin and lifted its full year outlook.

On the downside

Mortgage insurers PMI Group (NYSE: PMI) and Radian Group (NYSE: RDN) both fell after MGIC Investment (NYSE: MTG) reported a wider than expected loss for the first quarter.

Brookline Bancorp (Nasdaq: BRKL) reported higher first quarter earnings and announced a $234 million cash and stock deal to acquire Bancorp Rhode Island (Nasdaq: BARI).

Wedbush downgraded Smith Micro Software (Nasdaq: SMSI) to a neutral rating.

In the broad market, advancing issues outpaced decliners by a margin of more than 4 to 1 on the NYSE and by nearly 7 to 2 on Nasdaq. The Russell 2000 which tracks small cap stocks leaped 16 points to 839.