U.S. stocks rose on the day Friday and also posted gains for the week, boosted by a surge in Boeing shares, President Donald Trump's plan to reopen the coronavirus-battered economy and hopes of a potential drug by Gilead to treat COVID-19.

The Nasdaq added 6.1% for the week and registered its biggest two-week percentage gain since 2001.

Boeing shares soared nearly 15% on plans to restart commercial jet production in Washington state after halting operations last month due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Gilead Sciences Inc surged almost 10% following a report that patients with severe symptoms of COVID-19, the respiratory disease caused by the coronavirus, had responded positively to its experimental drug remdesivir. The report cited partial data from a University of Chicago hospital, one 152 locations participating in the trial.

With no treatments or vaccines currently approved for the coronavirus, the news helped lift global equity markets. But Gilead said the totality of the data from the trial needed to be analyzed, and it expected to report results from a study testing the drug in severe COVID-19 patients at the end of April.

"If you can ultimately get a powerful treatment in lieu of a vaccine in the next couple of months, that would be good for cyclical stocks, anything economically sensitive," said R.J. Grant, head of trading at Keefe, Bruyette & Woods in New York. "If we can get some sort of back-to-normal in some way that the economy could start to function, the banks are going to rip," he added.

The S&P 500 is up nearly 30% from its March trough following a raft of global stimulus and hopes that the spread of the virus was nearing a peak in the United States.

However, the S&P remains about 15% off its all-time high, and strategists have warned of a deep economic slump from the halt in business activity and layoffs.

Some U.S. states are expected to begin announcing timetables for lifting restrictions. On Thursday, Trump unveiled guidelines for a staggered, three-stage process by states to lift restrictions on business and social life to curb the pandemic.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 704.81 points, or 2.99%, to 24,242.49, the S&P 500 gained 75.01 points, or 2.68%, to 2,874.56 and the Nasdaq Composite added 117.78 points, or 1.38%, to 8,650.14.

For the week, the Dow added 2.2% and the S&P 500 rose 3%.

The reopening guidelines "provide some hope and optimism for folks and the market and the whole economy. It's a start," said Gary Bradshaw, portfolio manager at Hodges Capital Management in Dallas.

Bradshaw, who owns Boeing shares, said the planemaker's news was positive as well. "I certainly haven't given up on it," he said.

Bank stocks recovered after four straight days of losses triggered by lenders' reporting several billion dollars in reserves to cover potential loan defaults. The S&P 500 financial index ended up 5.6%, while the S&P energy index jumped 10.4%.

Apple Inc fell 1.4% as Goldman Sachs downgraded the stock on expectations of a 36% drop in iPhone shipments during the company's fiscal third quarter due to coronavirus-related lockdowns.

Volume on U.S. exchanges was 12.75 billion shares, compared to the 13.72 billion average for the full session over the last 20 trading days.

Advancing issues outnumbered declining ones on the NYSE by a 5.18-to-1 ratio; on Nasdaq, a 3.88-to-1 ratio favored advancers.

The S&P 500 posted 10 new 52-week highs and no new lows; the Nasdaq Composite recorded 31 new highs and 13 new lows.

GLOBAL MARKETS

Global stocks rallied, while the dollar fell amid investors' growing risk-on sentiment.

The bulls charged ahead on a report that patients with severe COVID-19 symptoms had responded positively to Gilead Sciences' experimental drug remdesivir, lifting Gilead's shares by 9.7%. Analysts and the company have urged caution on drawing any conclusions, however.

Boeing's announcement it would resume production of commercial jets next week also buoyed sentiment and gave traders a reason to shrug off a 6.8% decline in Chinese gross domestic product in the first quarter, the first contraction since 1992, when modern record-keeping began.

The dollar slid against the euro and Japanese yen, and gold fell as much as 2% as investors globally drew comfort from Trump's plans to gradually re-open the U.S. economy in a three-stage approach.

China along with Germany, Italy, Spain and other parts of Europe also have plans to reopen their economies even as the death toll from the pandemic rises.

"It's too early to signal the all-clear, but I do think we're making progress," said Michael Arone, chief investment strategist at State Street Global Advisors in Boston.

Economies will not fully recover until people are comfortable they can move about in public without being exposed to the coronavirus and getting sick, he said. Also, laid-off workers must be rehired but the good news is at least half indicate their situation is temporary, he said.

MSCI's gauge of stocks across the globe gained 2.59%, while the pan-European STOXX 600 index rose 2.63%, climbing more than 8% the last two weeks.

The death toll from the coronavirus hit 150,000 on Friday, according to a Reuters tally.

Asia had a strong session. Tokyo's Nikkei and Seoul's KOPSI both closed up over 3%. Copper, a global economic bellwether, rose was up nearly 4% for the week to post its biggest weekly gain since February 2019.

The dollar index fell 0.126%, with the euro up 0.29% to $1.0866. The yen strengthened 0.33% versus the greenback at 107.61 per dollar.

But the pandemic still spurred gloomy news.

Credit rating firm S&P Global downgraded another clutch of countries hit by the coronavirus and warned that even triple-A and other top-rated nations could be cut depending on how they manage the longer-term consequences of the pandemic.

In Europe, Italy's government bonds, which have been under pressure as the country's virus difficulties push its debt-to-GDP ratio toward 150%, rallied again.

U.S. long-dated Treasury yields fell to two-week lows, despite higher-risk appetite overall. Benchmark 10-year notes last fell 13/32 in price to yield 0.6496%.

U.S. gold futures settled down 1.9% at $1,698.80 an ounce.

U.S. crude futures hit 18-year lows, trading below $18 a barrel for part of the session as WTI extended losses in comparison to global benchmark Brent, in part due to the coming expiration of the current May contract. But later-dated contracts also fell as U.S. storage rapidly fills.

Oil prices have remained weak even after the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries and other producers last weekend announced a deal to cut output.

Brent futures rose 26 cents, or 0.9%, to settle at $28.08 a barrel while West Texas Intermediate crude contract for June, which became the day's more active contract, ended the session down 50 cents, or 2%, at $25.03.

The less active prompt WTI for May delivery tumbled by $1.60, or 8.1%, to $18.27, ahead of its April 21 expiration. The contract slumped to a low of $17.31 a barrel during the session, the lowest since November 2001.