Though the volume was very light on the major exchanges today, there were plenty of big stories to go around. Oil prices finished above $80 a barrel today for the first time ever as Hurricane Humberto shut down some major oil refineries. Though higher oil prices can generally be a deterrent to the equities market, stocks finished higher across the board. The Dow gained 133 points, the Nasdaq gained 9, and the S&P 500 gained 12 points. 
Two major Dow components drove the huge gain in the Dow today. General Motors Corporation (NYSE:GM) shares leapt by 10.05% on nearly triple their average daily volume after Citigroup speculated that the company may be getting closer to hammering out a money saving deal with its union. McDonald's Corporation (NYSE:MCD) shares jumped by 6.05% after the company raised its dividend by a stunning 50%. MCD shares will now yield around 3%.
A third dow component, Alcoa Inc (NYSE:AA), also helped the index by gaining 2.29% on the session. The company was part of a broad rally in the basic materials sector. Steel manufacturer Nucor Corporation (NYSE:NUE) gaind 5.31% after the company announced intentions to buy Nelson Steel for $54 million.
Communications companies stocks were quite strong today. AT&T (NYSE:T) shares traded higher by 2.28% on the day. Verizon Communications (NYSE:VZ) shares rose by 1.77%.
As one would expect, the energy sector was rather strong today on the news of the higher crude oil and gasoline prices. Suncor Energy (NYSE:SU) shares leapt by 4.29% to lead the sector higher. Oil refiners such as Tesoro Corporation (NYSE:TSO) and Frontier Oil Corporation (NYSE:FTO) were strong on the day, with TSO gaining 4.17% and FTO gaining 4.06%.
There were several notable 52 week highs today on both the NYSE and the Nasdaq. EBAY Inc. (NYSE:EBAY) shares gained 2.39% to finish at a new 52 week high. PepsiCo Inc (NYSE:PEP) also hit an intraday high of $70.48 before ending the day at $69.88. Consumer giant Proctor and Gamble (NYSE:PG) hit its 4th straight 52 week high this week, gaining 0.22% on the day.
Today's trading was certainly encouraging for the bulls, but very few market participants feel like the day was very telling of any trend in the market. The volume on the exchanges was even lighter than we have been recently.
Investors are certainly going to be watching tommorrow's economic data very closely. The retail sales report is due out at 8:30 tommorrow morning. The preliminary consumer sentiment data is due out tommorrow at 10 am. I will be closely watching the consumer sentiment data to see if there is follow through from last month's plunge in confidence or not. Volatility is likely to be fairly high tommorrow, as investors finish out the week digesting the last major economic reports before the FOMC meeting next week.
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