After weeks of worries about the economy pulled stocks down, indexes have risen sharply for two days in a row.

The Dow Jones industrial average rose more than 140 points Tuesday, thanks in part to signs that concerns of a global slowdown may be overblown.

Quarterly results from Nike Inc. bested analysts' expectations and sent its stock up 10 percent. That helped lead to a rally in stocks of clothing stores, restaurants and jewelers. Such companies tend to do well when consumers are less worried about things like high gas prices and are willing to spend on themselves.

Other industries that do well during periods of economic expansion led the stock market higher. Caterpillar Inc., one of the 30 stocks that make up the Dow, gained the most, rising 3 percent. Industrials gained 1.5 percent overall. Consumer discretionary companies gained 1.9 percent.

Both sectors are still well below their highs for the year. Industrials and consumer companies have lost 5.8 percent and 3.6 percent, respectively, since peaking on April 29.

The Dow gained 145.13 points, or 1.2 percent, to 12,188.69. The Standard & Poor's 500 index rose 16.57, or 1.3 percent, to 1,296.67. The Nasdaq composite index added 41.03, or 1.5 percent, to 2,729.31. All three indexes are down more than 3 percent for the month.

Signs that the housing market is improving helped lift Home Depot Inc. It's sales benefit when consumers spend money on home improvement. Home Depot gained 2.4 percent following a report that home prices rose in April in 13 of the 20 cities tracked by the Standard & Poor's/Case-Shiller index. The index rose for the first time in eight months thanks to an annual push to buy homes in the spring.

Xcel Energy Inc. and its Colorado subsidiary were acquitted of criminal charges Tuesday in the deaths of five workers at a hydroelectric plant tunnel in the mountains west of Denver.

After nearly three days of deliberations, a jury in Denver's U.S. District Court acquitted the Minneapolis-based utility and Public Service Co. of Colorado of five counts of violating federal safety regulations, including not having a rescue plan.

The workers were trapped in the Cabin Creek plant tunnel near Georgetown, about 40 miles west of Denver, when a flammable solvent they were using to clean an epoxy paint sprayer ignited Oct. 2, 2007.

The workers communicated via radio for 45 minutes with colleagues and rescue crews. Reaching them would have involved using ropes or ladders to go down a 20-foot vertical section of tunnel, then along a 1,000-foot section at a 55-degree slope, to reach a horizontal section where the workers were. Rescuers tried lowering air tanks to the trapped workers, but the workers were overcome by smoke and fumes.

Killed were Donald Dejaynes, 43, Dupree Holt, 37, James St. Peters, 52, Gary Foster, 48, and Anthony Aguirre, 18, all of California.

Federal prosecutors had argued that Xcel knew about dangerous conditions deep inside the power plant tunnel and violated U.S. safety regulations. Xcel attorney Cliff Stricklin insisted the utility followed the law and that California-based contractor RPI Coating Inc., which employed the workers, was responsible for their safety.

Xcel and Public Service Co. each had been charged with five counts of violating Occupational Safety and Health Administration regulations. If convicted, each company could have faced fines of up to $2.5 million.

Two Senate rebels jumped into Congress' cut-the-deficit competition on Tuesday, proposing to raise the age of Medicare eligibility to 67 and increase monthly premiums for millions of current beneficiaries.

"We can't save Medicare as we know it," said Sen. Joseph Lieberman, I-Conn., who authored the plan with Republican Sen. Tom Coburn of Oklahoma. "We can only save Medicare if we change it," he added in an apparent jab at President Barack Obama and congressional Democrats.

Democrats reacted with criticism of the proposal, which Coburn said was designed to rescue the financially imperiled program and help the nation confront a "wall of debt." Republicans betrayed no sign of support either.

If nothing else, the response underscored the difficulty of legislative free-lancing at a time the Obama administration and congressional leaders are struggling to negotiate a compromise that cuts future deficits and clears the way for an increase in the nation's $14.3 trillion debt.

Without a debt limit increase by Aug. 2, Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner has warned, the government could default, risking calamity for the U.S. economy and serious effects worldwide.

Republicans walked out of bipartisan talks last week but nevertheless said negotiations had been fruitful. In the days since, Obama has stepped up his personal involvement in the effort.