Generally encouraging data that suggested winter's economic deep freeze might be thawing led to broad-based gains for equities despite some slippage at week's end. The Dow finally managed to surpass briefly the record closing high it hadn't seen since New Year's Eve. However, of the four domestic indices in the table below, the S&P 500 remained the only one still in positive territory year-to-date. Meanwhile, the Fed's steady-as-she-goes approach to tapering helped boost demand for the benchmark 10-year Treasury, whose yield fell to its lowest level so far this year.
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