New York - US stocks finished a volatile session higher on Thursday, as a jump in oil prices lifted beaten-down petroleum shares and boosted investor sentiment.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 115.94 points (0.74%) to 15 882.68.
The broad-based S&P 500 rose 9.66 (0.52%) to 1 868.99, while the tech-rich Nasdaq Composite Index added a scant 0.37 (0.01%) at 4 472.06.
The gains were a welcome shift after the battering on Wednesday that pushed leading US indices as much as 3.5% lower. They came on the heels of rallies in European stocks after the European Central Bank hinted at new stimulus in March.
US oil prices jumped 4.2% to $29.53 a barrel, a move partly seen as a technical bounce Wednesday's sharp decline to a 12-year low.
Dow members Chevron and ExxonMobil rose 2.6% and 1.6%. Smaller producers such as Apache and Marathon Oil surged 7.6% and 11.8%.
Still, trade was choppy, with the Nasdaq briefly falling into negative territory in the afternoon and the Dow and S&P 500 ending well below session peaks.
"There's a lot of damage on the tape and I want to be sure the lows made yesterday afternoon hold, before we get too excited and buy things," said Mace Blicksilver, director of Marblehead Asset Management.
"It's nothing really to get that excited about that oil bounced a dollar."
US-listed Chinese stocks rose, with Alibaba climbing 2.9%, Baidu 2.8% and Weibo 1.3%.
Verizon rose 3.3% as it reported $5.5bn in fourth-quarter earnings, compared with a loss of $2.1bn a year ago, besting expectations. The telecom giant expects 2016 earnings comparable to those of 2015.
Railroad Union Pacific slid 3.6% after reporting fourth-quarter earnings fell to $1.1bn as business volumes declined nine percent.
United Airlines rose 0.5% after reporting fourth-quarter earnings of $823m, much above the $28m in the year-ago period. United also announced an order for 40 new 737 to 700 aircraft from Boeing worth about $3.2bn. Boeing rose 1.0%.