By Rick Glaze

While the Dow Jones Industrial Average of 30 blue chip companies and the S&P 500 were little changed last week, the Nasdaq index gained just under 1 percent, continuing a rally that has brought it up almost 8 percent since its mid-April low. The tech-heavy index is less than 5 percent below its level at the beginning of the year.

Late last week the market responded positively to an upward revision in first-quarter GDP to 3.5 percent. This was an improvement over the 3.1 percent growth originally reported. The GDP is a measure of all economic activity in a country.

Large industrialized countries have favorable growth in the 3 percent to 4 percent range, while newly industrialized countries, such as China, can grow much faster. Many countries in Europe have close to zero percent growth, largely attributed to high taxes and low productivity per worker. But it is a wonderful place to visit. The word from the travel industry is that Europe is “sold out” this summer. I hope you already have your tickets.

This week, professionals are looking for reports on vehicle and industrial sales as well as productivity and employment. Investors pay close attention to earnings reports, and the pre-announcements of earnings are showing a slightly negative bent for large companies. Smaller and midsize companies, though, still are taking advantage of a strong economic recovery.

Home builders were strong last week, while industrial production gave signs of picking up but is still in the doldrums longer term. The Federal Reserve Board is aware of this situation and may decide to raise interest rates.