The New York Stock Exchange could hit an all time high next week if the Federal Reserve hints that is going to halt its series of interest rate rises, traders said.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average closed at a six-year high of 11,577.74 points on Friday having gained 1.85 percent over the week. The all time closing high of 11,722.98 was reached on January 14, 2000.
The tech-heavy Nasdaq rose 0.86 percent over the week to hit 2,342,57 points, while the Standard and Poor's 500 rose 1.1 percent to 1,325.76.
SG Cowen analyst Michael Malone said: "I think it's probably going to be a good week for the stock market." He said that the outlook for interest rates made investors "fairly bullish for stocks".
With inflation concerns receding and growth still strong, "you'll see investors more willing to be a little bit more aggressive than now and push the market higher," he predicted.
New Fed chairman, Ben Bernanke announced in April a possible pause in the regular small interest rate hikes. The US central bank will meet again Wednesday and investors hope it will hint when the pause is likely to come.
"The market is very concerned that the Federal Reserve will overshoot, do what they did in 1999-2000 and abort the economic expansion by over tightening," said Mike Holland, equity analyst for Holland Balanced Fund.
"That's the market concern, my guess is that the Federal Reserve will not make that mistake, but that's just a guess."
The announcement on Friday that fewer jobs than expected had been created in April, boosted market hopes that interest rates would soon calm, said Malone.
The Labour Department's "non-farm payrolls" report showed that US employers added 138,000 new jobs in April, the worst level since October and much less than Wall Street's forecast of 200,000.
The market will be particularly looking this week at retail sales figures to be announced on Thursday and the trade balance on Friday.
Bonds rose during the week, the yield on 10-year treasury bonds hitting 5.108 percent, against 5.069 percent the previous week. For 30-year bonds the rate rose to 5.195 percent from 5.169 percent.