YAHOO [BRIEFING.COM]: News of renewed merger and acquisition activity didn't bring many participants to the market, but stocks were still able to sport broad-based gains for the entire session and log their best gain in one month.

Stocks were given support in the early going by news that Xerox (XRX 7.68, -1.29) will pay $6.4 billion in cash and stock for Affiliated Computer Systems (ACS 53.86, +6.61), while Abbott Labs (ABT 48.58, +1.12) will pay $6.6 billion in cash for Solvay's drug business.

Though it was overshadowed by the larger deals, American Securities announced it will acquire GenTek (GETI 37.77, +10.77) for $38.00 per share, which represents a near 40% premium over GETI's closing price last Friday.

The supportive role played by Monday morning's M&A news helped stocks to recover from their worst weekly loss since July.

Several sectors had their moments of leadership, but by the end of the session financials logged the best gains. The sector settled with a gain of little more than 3.4%, which marks the sector's best single-session percentage advance in two months. Multiline insurers (+6.0%) underpinned the financial sector's impressive move.

Consumer staples stocks lagged on a relative basis as Dow component Kraft (KFT 26.17, -0.07) showed moderate weakness. Still, the sector netted a gain of 0.5%.

Though stocks traded with broad-based gains, there wasn't much behind them. Trading volume on the NYSE fell to its lowest level in one month, coming in below 1 billion shares.

Despite broad-based buying among equities, Treasuries were still able to advance. As such, the benchmark 10-year Note gained 11 ticks, which sent its yield down to multimonth lows of 3.28%.

The U.S. dollar also showed strength, which drove the Dollar Index to a 0.2% gain. Despite that move, commodities were still able to garner support and send the CRB Commodity Index up 0.6%.

Advancing Sectors: Financials +3.4%, Materials +2.0%, Consumer Discretionary +2.0%, Technology +1.7%, Energy +1.7%, Industrials +1.6%, Telecom +1.5%, Health Care +1.4%, Utilities +0.9%, Consumer Staples +0.5%
Declining Sectors: (None)DJ30 +124.17 NASDAQ +39.82 NQ100 +1.8% R2K +2.4% SP400 +2.1% SP500 +18.60 NASDAQ Adv/Vol/Dec 1987/1.91 bln/662 NYSE Adv/Vol/Dec 2419/979 mln/607