Best four-week gain since 1938

Stocks weathered a very bad unemployment report on Friday and not only finished higher for the day but enjoyed their best four-week gain since 1938. The finish was quite bullish: The Dow Jones industrials ($INDU), which had been down as much as 80 points in the morning, recovered to close up 40 points, or 0.5%, to 8,018, their first close above 8,000 since Feb. 10. The Standard & Poor's 500 Index ($INX) was up 8 points, or 1%, to 843, and the Nasdaq Composite Index ($COMPX) was up 19 points, or 1.2%, to 1,622.

The market finished with its fourth weekly gain in a row. The Dow's total gain since March 6 is about 21%, with the S&P up 23.2% and the Nasdaq up 25.3%.

The Dow's 21% gain in the four weeks since March 6 is its biggest since 1938. If you measure the gain only against four-week periods where each week finished higher, it’s the best since the four weeks that ended on May 12, 1933.