The nation's private employers added more jobs than expected in October to lift the markets to a sharply higher open with the Dow soaring 143 points to 13,240. Nasdaq surged 34 points to 3012. On the upside
RedPrairie will pay a premium of approximately $1.9 billion in cash to acquire JDA Software Group (Nasdaq: JDAS). Radian (NYSE: RDN) posted a better than expected profit for the third quarter. MGIC Investment (NYSE: MTG) agreed to pay Freddie Mac over a four year period in order to settle a coverage dispute.On the downside Barrick Gold (NYSE: ABX) disappointed with sharply lower third quarter earnings and revenue that fell short of analyst expectations and raised the cash costs for gold. Second quarter earnings surged for Cirrus Logic (Nasdaq: CRUS) to surpass analyst expectations and the company forecast current quarter revenue well ahead of analyst estimates but the stock price dropped. Abiomed (Nasdaq: ABMD) reported higher second quarter earnings and revenue but the stock price fell. In the broad market, advancing issues outpaced decliners by a margin of 7 to 2 on the NYSE and by nearly 7 to 3 on Nasdaq. The Russell 2000 which tracks small cap stocks climbed 7 points to 825.