Global Stock Exchanges - US stocks keep rallying.

Byline: S. Kamal Hayder Kazmi

US stocks rallied on Friday, helping Wall Street's major indexes advance for the fourth consecutive week, as increased hopes the United States and China would resolve their trade dispute lifted shares across sectors.

he market was boosted after a Bloomberg report said China sought to raise its annual goods imports from the United States by a combined value of more than $1 trillion in order to reduce its trade surplus to zero by 2024.

The news followed a report on Thursday that U.S. Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin was considering lifting some or all tariffs imposed on Chinese imports. A Treasury spokesman denied Mnuchin had made any such recommendation.

A strong rally in January has put the benchmark SandP 500 index on track for its best monthly gain since March 2016. The SandP 500 is now 8.9 percent below its Sept. 20 record close after dropping 19.8 percent below that level - near the 20-percent threshold commonly considered to confirm a bear market - on Christmas Eve.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 336.25 points, or 1.38 percent, to 24,706.35, the SandP 500 gained 34.75 points, or 1.32 percent, to 2,670.71 and the Nasdaq Composite added 72.77 points, or 1.03...