Wall Street Gains on Lower Oil Prices AROUND THE MARKETS STOCKS: NEW YORK

U.S. stocks rose on Friday, trimming the week’s losses, after a measure of consumer confidence rose more than expected this month and oil closed below $60 a barrel.

Lower energy costs “will help the consumer continue to shop, and that will be critical to driving the economy next year,” said Robert Froehlich, the chairman of the investor strategy committee at Scudder Investments. The University of Michigan reinforced hopes for a solid holiday shopping season when it said its consumer sentiment index for December added 7.1 points to 88.7. Oil and gas prices fell. On the New York Mercantile Exchange, natural gas fell 68.2 cents to $14.312 per 1,000 cubic feet, and a barrel of light crude fell $1.27 to $59.39.

In afternoon trading, the Dow Jones industrial average gained 23.46 to 10,778.58. Broader stock indicators were also higher. The Standard & Poor’s 500 index was up 3.53 at 1,259.37, and the Nasdaq composite index added 10.27 to 2,256.73. Shares of Intel rose 38 cents to close at $26.08, extending an overnight slide after the company’s eagerly awaited mid-quarter update gave a sales outlook that fell a shade below the average estimate of analysts.

The drug maker Eli Lilly said its 2005 profit should hit the high end of its forecast and pegged next year’s earnings ahead of analysts’ predictions. Eli Lilly rose $1.20 to $53.41.

The U.S. rural telecommunications provider Alltel said it planned to become a pure wireless carrier by spinning off its fixed-line phone business and merging that unit with Valor Communications Group in a $4.9 billion deal. Alltel was up $1.06 at $65.88, while Valor rose 7 cents to $12.31.

GE rose 18 cents to $35.53. The company raised its share buybacks by 25 percent to $5 billion in 2005 as part of a previously announced plan to repurchase $25 billion of stock by 2008.

The video game maker Electronic Arts is acquiring Jamdat Mobile, which provides games and ring tones for cellphones, in a deal worth about $680 million in cash. EA fell 61 cents to $55.14; Jamdat surged $4.29 to $27.06.