Wall Street closed higher on back of retailers

U.S. stocks continued to build on their recent gains on Thursday as the solid reports from big retailers ahead of tomorrow's preliminary GDP growth data suggested that the consumer spending was gathering momentum.

Fueled by Best Buy's 22% gain to a record high, the S&P 500 retail index .SPXRT rose nearly 2% while the discretionary index .SPLRCD added 1.2%, hauling the S&P 500 Index to its second consecutive record close.

"The lack of fear, the complacency is supporting the market. At the same time, the Fed (minutes) yesterday is really nothing new. The Fed has done a very good job of communicating its plans to the market, so it's been managing expectations fairly well," Jimmy Chang, chief investment strategist at Rockefeller & Co in New York, told Reuters.

However, the upsurge in the equity indexes was capped by the falling oil prices on the disappointing details of the OPEC's agreement to extend the output cuts, which caused the S&P energy index .SPNYto drop nearly 2%. 

• Forex today: OPEC was the focus sending WTI off a cliff by circa $4.00

The Dow Jones Industrial Average added 70.53 points, or 0.34%, to 21,082.95, the S&P 500 gained 11.50 points, or 0.48%, to 2,416.81 and the Nasdaq Composite was up 53.18 points, or 0.86%, at 6,216.21.

Headlines from the U.S. session:

• US budget to spur jobs? - BBH
• How much can the US economy grow? - BBH
• US Dollar sticks to daily gains above 97
• Fitch: OPEC deal to cut oil inventories, but shale key long-term
• Several months left of US economic policy uncertainty - BBH
• OPEC Conference President: long-term trend will be healthy
• OPEC Conference President: we can extend oil output deal in November
• Iraq Oil Minister: drop in oil prices is ordinary price fluctuation after each OPEC meeting
• Fed's Brainard: Upward revisions to global growth will continue
• US: Wholesale inventories for April were estimated at $592.0 billion
• US: Weekly initial claims was 234,000, an increase of 1,000 from the previous week