YAHOO [BRIEFING.COM]: The Fed's decision to hike the discount rate after the prior session's close stirred market participants to dump stocks in pursuit of the dollar, but the dollar inevitably drifted lower and stocks managed to recover and finish the week with their fourth straight gain.

Given that the Fed's decision to lift the discount rate to 0.75% from 0.50% marked the first rate hike in one year, participants panicked a bit and made a knee-jerk decision to sell stocks. The announcement shouldn't have come as a complete surprise, though. After all, Fed Chairman gave market participants a clue during his recent testimony before the House Financial Services Committee that a modest increase in the spread between the discount rate and the target federal funds rate was expected before long.

Still, to help quell concern about what may be in store, the Fed expressed that its decision was not a signal for any change in the economy or monetary policy. Several Fed officials made similar, separate comments of their own about how to interpret the move, but many seemed to ignore the notion that the increased discount rate was a tacit sign that the financial system is back on firmer footing.

In conjunction with the announcement the dollar was pushed higher, such that the Dollar Index climbed as much as 0.5% to new multimonth highs and even broke through a key technical resistance level that restrained its gain in the previous session. However, the greenback eventually rolled over and finished at a session low with a 0.5% loss against a basket of foreign currencies.

A softer-than-expected inflationary reading played a hand in the dollar's downturn. The Consumer Price Index (CPI) for January made a 0.2% monthly gain, which was slightly below the 0.3% increase that had been widely expected. Excluding food and energy, consumer prices for January actually slipped 0.1% month-over-month, instead of the 0.1% monthly increase that economists had forecast.

As the dollar surrendered its gain, stocks were able to regroup and make a broad-based bounce to positive territory. The move took the S&P 500 above its 50-day moving average to a one-month high, but buyers didn't step in at the higher price points to help stocks extend the move into something more meaningful. As a result, stocks traded with choppy action into the close and left the stock market to settle with a modest gain, in-line with its 50-day moving average. Still, that was enough to give the stock market its fourth straight advance and a weekly gain of more than 3% -- its best weekly performance in three months.

Advancing Sectors: Utilities (+1.4%), Financials (+0.6%), Industrials (+0.5%), Materials (+0.5%), Consumer Discretionary (+0.4%), Energy (+0.2%), Consumer Staples (+0.1%)
Declining Sectors: Telecom (-0.3%), Health Care (-0.2%), Tech (-0.1%)DJ30 +9.45 NASDAQ +2.16 NQ100 0.00% R2K +0.4% SP400 +0.5% SP500 +2.42 NASDAQ Adv/Vol/Dec 1385/2.13 bln/1230 NYSE Adv/Vol/Dec 1793/1.12 bln/1227