The Dow Jones Industrial Average closed up 95.99 points to10,562.30 and the Nasdaq was up 25.29 points to 2,142.92 on thin volume. With some analysts nowpredicting that stocks may have bottomed and bad corporatenews behind us, some investors seemed ready to take theplunge into equities once again. "With the Fed still easing, taxcuts pending, and inventories correcting, we expect a pickup inU.S. growth by the fourth quarter at the latest," said BruceSteinberg, chief U.S. economist at Merrill Lynch in their weeklycommentary.