FRANKFURT, Germany - Stocks pushed higher Friday as better than expected U.S. retail sales data and positive corporate news overshadowed fears from Europe's debt crisis. U.S. retail sales for September rose 1.1 percent, ahead of 0.7 percent market expectations. That indicated to some that the world's largest economy might not be in as much trouble as feared earlier. "Today's data suggests a better outcome for third quarter consumption," said Robert Lynch at HSBC Global Research. "That is an encouraging development in an economy that has generally been on the receiving end of bad news." The markets took the news as positive despite some economists fears that a weak labor market and the need for consumers to save and pay down debt will mean the retail bounce is only temporary. A batch of corporate news from companies like Google and Unilever had earlier buoyed sentiment. In Europe, the FTSE 100 index of leading British shares closed up 1.2 percent at 5,466.36, while Germany's DAX 30 rose 0.9 percent to 5,967.20. France's CAC 40 ended 1 percent higher at 3,217.89. In the U.S., the Dow Jones industrial average rose 0.6 percent to 11,551 and the broader Standard & Poor's 500 share index was up 0.9 percent at 1,214. Evidence of the more risk-on backdrop was evident in oil prices and the performance of the euro currency too - New York Mercantile month-ahead crude was up $2.20 to $86.43, while the euro traded 0.9 percent higher to $1.3852.

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