U. S. stocks rallied, sending the Standard & Poorfs 500 Index to its best gain in six weeks, as analyst Meredith Whitney recommended buying shares of Goldman Sachs Group Inc. and said banks may advance 15 %. Goldman Sachs climbed 5.3 % as Whitney gave the firm the only gbuyh rating among the eight companies she covers. Bank of America Corp. jumped 9.3 %, the most in almost two months, after the analyst told CNBC the shares were the gcheapesth among U. S. banks. Barclays Plc lifted its year]end estimate for the S&P 500 by 23 % to 930 and said U. S. stocks are poised for a grecovery rallyh as the worldfs largest economy improves. Goldman Sachs, JPMorgan Chase & Co., International Business Machines Corp. and Google Inc. are among more than 30 companies in the S&P 500 Index scheduled to report results this week. Goldman Sachs may post the largest profit since it set earnings records in 2007.

The U. K. housing market improved last month as more London realestate agents and surveyors said home values increased rather than fell for the first time in 20 months, the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors said.

Asian stocks rose, lifting the MSCI Asia Pacific Index from an eightweek low, as Posco raised its production target and Singapore upgraded its forecast for economic growth. Posco, South Koreafs largest steelmaker, climbed 3.5 % in Seoul after saying 2009 output may be 6.4 % higher than forecast.

Chinafs economy may have expanded 7.8 % in the second quarter as record lending and surging investment drove a rebound from the weakest growth in almost a decade, a survey shows. The median forecast of 20 economists in a Bloomberg News survey compares with a 6.1 % expansion in the previous three months from a year earlier. The government will announce gross domestic product in Beijing on July 16.

State Bank of India Chairman O. P. Bhatt on Monday exhorted industry chiefs not to weaken the Indian banking system by asking for lower interest rates, saying that he saw a firming up of interest rates in the near short term.gDepending on the speed of growth of assets, a change in the economic cycle and if there is increased growth, interest rates may increase between 25 and 100 basis points once the busy season sets in,.