Kevin Gardiner, HSBC’s chief global equity strategist, sees the Standard & Poor’s 500 index surging 28 percent over the rest of the year to 1,000.

“At the start of the year, that [level] looked quite conservative,” he tells Bloomberg TV. “About 10 days ago it looked crazily optimistic. Now it seems reasonably feasible.”

Bottom line: “I think eventually the dust will settle, and the market will rally materially,” he says.

Despite the lack of detail in the Obama administration’s bank rescue plan, Gardiner is optimistic on the financial front.

“That’s what Fed addressed Wednesday,” he says.

“The U.S. authorities are trying to signal that they will do whatever is necessary to keep the banking system together and the economy afloat. I think eventually they will be successful.”

As for sectors of the market that have strong potential, “I feel there is more upside for financial stocks in Europe and the U.S. over the next six months,” Gardiner says.

Now that crude oil’s drop apparently has ended, he’s also bullish on oil stocks. And Gardiner likes cyclical plays, such as industrial stocks.

He sees the economic contraction slowing in the second quarter and possibly even turning into an expansion. As a result, “there is some upside for some of these [industrial] stocks to come.”

Not everyone is so bullish. “There’s still a lot of headwinds in the marketplace,” Eric Savitch, associate director of trading at Keefe, Bruyette & Woods, tells the Associated Press.