Wall Street was up on Friday for the shortened trading session following Thanksgiving, even if consumer-related stocks did not play the role of locomotives as they often do at this time of year.

Shortly before 11:00 a.m. (New York time), the Dow Jones index climbed 0.4% to 44,897.9 points, while the Nasdaq Composite gained more than 0.6% to 19,183.8 points.

With a gain of 0.5%, the S&P 500 set a new record a few moments ago at nearly 6030.5 points.

Closed yesterday for the Thanksgiving holiday, equity markets will close at 1:00 p.m. (local time), i.e. three hours ahead of schedule, this Friday.

In the absence of any economic indicators, trading volumes are expected to be limited, with many investors opting to "bridge the gap" to stay with their families.

Usually the big winners on Black Friday, retail stocks are hardly benefiting from this major consumer event, which marks the start of the end-of-year shopping season with a series of major promotions.

Among the sector's heavyweights, Walmart gained 0.7%, Best Buy recovered 3% and Target gained 0.8%.

Analysts point out that retail stocks have performed well on the stock market of late, meaning that the prospect of a strong Christmas season is now priced in.

Ten of the 11 major S&P sector indices are up, with only utilities being shunned by the market, down 0.1%.

For the week as a whole, which has been reduced to three and a half sessions, the Dow is currently up 2.3%, the S&P 500 is up 1.3% and the Nasdaq is up just over 1%.

Next week should see more action on Wall Street, with the release of monthly employment figures on Friday, ahead of the Fed's monetary policy meeting on December 17 and 18.

On the currency markets, the dollar rallied against the euro, which had benefited this morning from inflation figures that seemed to rule out the scenario of an aggressive 50 basis point rate cut by the ECB in December.

The single currency thus fell back below the 1.0550 threshold against the greenback.

Treasuries continue to rally, pushing the ten-year yield down to close to its lowest level in almost a month, around 4.21%.

The price of light crude rises by 1.1% to $69.5, as investors look ahead to next week's meeting of the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries.

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