US STOCKS-Wall St rises as upbeat Cisco and Disney results help fuel optimism

(For a Reuters live blog on U.S., UK and European stock
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* Cisco, Disney gain ground after quarterly reports
* Biden aids talk targeted COVID restrictions vs national
lockdown
* Indexes up: Dow 1.31%, S&P 1.14%, Nasdaq 0.61%

(Updates to late afternoon, adds commentary, New York dateline,
changes byline)
By Sinéad Carew
NEW YORK, Nov 13 (Reuters) - Wall Street gained ground on
Friday with upbeat earnings reports helping to drive optimism
about the economy even as investors weighed a current surge in
virus cases against hopes for successful COVID-19 vaccines.
After a volatile trading week where the market was whipsawed
between hopes and fears around the virus, Cisco Systems Inc
CSCO.O led gainers among the S&P 500 after its quarterly
report showed a work-from-home driven surge in demand.
While the network gear maker jumped 7%, Walt Disney Co
DIS.N rose 2% as its rapidly growing streaming video business,
and a partial recovery at its theme parks tempered its quarterly
loss. The reports likely helped investors look beyond a current
surge in virus cases and a bleak winter ahead, said Tom Martin,
senior portfolio manager at Globalt Investments in Atlanta.
"We know we've got some tough times ahead but mid-2021 you
can potentially see that with a vaccine and better treatment
instead of the coronavirus causing more damage you see that
there's a recovery ahead," said Martin. "You're at that time of
year when people are starting to look forward into 2021."
Martin also pointed to hopes that Moderna Inc MRNA.O is
close to releasing details of its vaccine progress, after the
company said on Wednesday it had enough data for a first interim
analysis of the late-stage trial of its experimental COVID-19
vaccine. Friday's outperformance of more economically sensitive
sectors including energy .SPNY , up 4%, and industrials
.SPLRCI , up 1.9%, over growth sectors like technology
.SPLRCT , up 0.5%, was an indication of "optimism around the
economy getting back on its footing," according to Martin.
At 2:57 p.m. EST, the Dow Jones Industrial Average .DJI
was up 398.05 points, or 1.37%, at 29,478.22, the S&P 500 .SPX
had gained 43.88 points, or 1.24%, to 3,580.89 and the Nasdaq
Composite .IXIC added 91.81 points, or 0.78%, to 11,801.40.
With third-quarter reports released from about 90% of S&P
500 companies Refinitiv IBES estimates now show profits falling
7.8% from last year compared with an Oct. 1 expectation for a
21.4% slump.
The three major U.S. stock indexes fell on Thursday as more
than a dozen U.S. states reported a doubling of new COVID-19
cases in the last two weeks, with Chicago's mayor issuing a
month-long stay-at-home advisory. But a senior adviser to President-elect Joe Biden said
there were no plans for nationwide lockdowns next year and
instead talked about restrictions for specific regions when the
virus spread is bad there.
Positive early data from a large vaccine study earlier this
week had prompted a rotation into the cyclical sectors and put
the S&P 500 .SPX and Dow .DJI on track for their second
weekly gains in a row.
The tech-heavy Nasdaq .IXIC , however, was headed for a
weekly decline as investors booked profits in technology stocks,
which have benefited from a stay-at-home environment.
Meanwhile, Biden's victory in the battleground state of
Arizona expanded his electoral vote margin, but the official
transition remains in limbo as President Donald Trump refuses to
concede. Growth stocks .RLG , currently largely comprised of tech
companies, edged 0.3% higher, while value names .RLV , which
currently include mostly cyclical stocks such as banks and
energy, advanced 1.8%.
Advancing issues outnumbered declining ones on the NYSE by a
4.44-to-1 ratio; on Nasdaq, a 2.49-to-1 ratio favored advancers.
The S&P 500 posted eight new 52-week highs and no new lows;
the Nasdaq Composite recorded 67 new highs and 11 new lows.