Big gain in Visa drives Dow Jones average higher

NEW YORK (AP) - Solid quarterly results from a range of big companies helped send the stock market slightly higher Thursday. The standout was Visa, whose 10 percent jump helped tug the Dow Jones industrial average up nearly 200 points.

Visa, the world's largest payment-processing company, turned in quarterly earnings late Wednesday that topped Wall Street's forecasts and announced plans to spend as much as $5 billion on buying its own shares.

For investors, there was plenty of encouraging news. Before the market opened, the government said that the U.S. economy grew at an annual rate of 3.5 percent in the three months ending in September, powered by more business investment, sales abroad and the biggest jump in military spending in five years.

"It's another report that indicates the economy can stand on its own two feet," said Peter Cardillo, chief market economist at Rockwell Global Capital Management, referring to the government's estimate of economic growth.

The Standard & Poor's 500 index gained 12.35 points, or 0.6 percent, to close at 1,994.65. The Nasdaq composite rose 16.91 points, or 0.4 percent, to 4,566.14.

The Dow Jones industrial average surged 221.11 points, or 1.3 percent, to 17,195.42. Unlike other market measures, the Dow weighs its roster of 30 large corporations by their stock prices rather than by their market size. That means companies with the most expensive stocks, such as Visa and Goldman Sachs, have more power to drive the average up or down.