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U.S. markets climb Wednesday

NEW YORK, Nov. 11 (UPI) -- U.S. market gains held up Wednesday with shares trading higher in home construction, airlines and marine transportation.

Veterans Day, a bank holiday, turned into the market's sixth straight day of gains.

By close, the Down Jones industrial average added 44.29 points, 0.43 percent, to 10,291.26. The Standard & Poor's 500 rose 5.50 points, 0.5 percent, to 1,098.51. The Nasdaq composite index climbed 0.74 percent, 15.82 points, to 2,166.90.

On the New York Stock Exchange, 1,875 stocks advanced and 1,129 declined on a volume of 4.2 billion shares traded.

The benchmark 10-year U.S. Treasury rose 2/32 Tuesday to close at 3.478 percent.

The euro rose to $1.498 from Tuesday's $1.4979. Against the yen, the dollar fell to 89.83 yen from Tuesday's 89.85 yen.

In Japan, the Nikkei 225 index rose 0.01 percent, 0.95, to 9,871.68.

In London, the FTSE 100 index rose 0.69 percent, 36.20, to 5,266.75.

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'Made in China' becomes less likely

BEIJING, Nov. 11 (UPI) -- Chinese exports are swinging away from the vast realm of light manufacturing to industrial goods, a private research group said.

The Beijing firm Dragonomics said light manufacturing fell from 45 percent to 30 percent of the nation's exports between 2002 and 2008. Heavy industrial goods, such as chemicals and steel, grew from 29 percent of the country's exports to 40 percent in the same years, The Los Angeles Times reported Wednesday.

"Light manufacturing is still very important, but it is a little anachronistic. It's less relevant than it was a decade ago," said Ben Simpfendorfer, chief China economist for the Royal Bank of Scotland.

As major economies worked their way through a prolonged recession, total exports from China for the first nine months of the year were about 20 percent lower compared to January through September of 2008, Global Trade Information Services reported.

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Ford sales grow in Europe

DEARBORN, Mich., Nov. 11 (UPI) -- Ford Motor Co. said Wednesday its sales in 19 European markets grew 12.8 percent in October compared with a year ago.

"This is the strongest October we've had in Europe for 12 years, and it shows we must be doing the right thing in the eyes of our customers," said Ingvar Sviggum, Ford of Europe's vice president of marketing, sales and service told the Detroit News.

"The key is having the right products at the right time for our customers, and this is why we're now the clear No .2 best-selling brand in the European auto industry," Sviggum said.

While holding onto a 9.1 percent market share in Europe, Ford has sold 1.2 million vehicles there in 2009, a decline of 3 percent from 2008, but less of a decline than competitors experienced, the News said.

Sviggum warned there were challenges ahead. "Given the ongoing weakness in the European market, further actions are needed at both the national and EU level to help bolster consumer confidence and demand," he said.

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Economist: Trade gap undermines recovery

COLLEGE PARK, Md., Nov. 11 (UPI) -- Former U.S. International Trade Commission economist Peter Morici warned a ballooning trade deficit would undermine an economic recovery.

"The trade deficit was a principal cause of the Great Recession. Now, it threatens to torpedo the economic recovery and keep unemployment above 10 percent for the foreseeable future," Morici wrote in a statement released Wednesday.

Figures on U.S. trade in goods and services are due Friday. Economists predict the gap will grow from $30.7 billion in August to $32 billion in September.

"More than anything else, U.S. businesses need customers -- more sales of U.S.-made goods and services -- to get the economy rolling and hire more Americans," Morici wrote.

The current trade gap is 2.7 percent of the U.S. gross domestic product, meaning it is subtracting more from the economy than the $787 billion federal stimulus package is adding to it, said Morici, currently a professor of economics at the University of Maryland.