Rise for US stocks

Heartening news on housing and corporate earnings are helping Wall Street to set aside some of its angst about the economy.

The Dow Jones industrial average and the Standard & Poor’s 500 have had their first gains in three sessions.

The US National Association of Realtors said today that buyers stepped in to snap up properties at steep discounts in December. And upbeat earnings reports from drugmakers Merck & Co and Schering Plough pulled the market higher.

The Dow is up 141 at 8,078. The S&P 500 index is up 13 at 838. The Nasdaq composite index is finishing up 21 at 1,516.

Losing stocks outnumbered gainers by 3 to 2 on the New York Stock Exchange, where volume came to a light 1.34 billion shares.