New York ? U.S. stocks surged Friday, with the Dow adding more than 200 points, after the Federal Reserve’s unexpected intervention, yet still ended with weekly losses.

“This morning’s move by the Fed is largely symbolic and suggests the Fed is willing to act in the event conditions in the financial markets deteriorate further, but we’re far from being out of the woods,” said Mike Malone, trading analyst at Cowen & Co.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average ended up 233.30 points, or 1.82 percent, to 13,079.1, giving it a weekly loss of 1.2 percent. Of the Dow’s 30 stocks, 25 closed ahead, led by Exxon Mobil Corp., which was up 4.3 percent amid a rise in the price of oil.

Bank stocks, hit hard by the relentless credit market upheaval, also were among the Dow’s larger gainers, with JP Morgan Chase Co. ahead 3.4 percent and Citicorp Inc. up 2.7 percent.

The S&P 500 index was up 34.67 points, or 2.5 percent, at 1,445.94, with the S&P losing 0.5 percent for the week.

The Nasdaq Composite climbed 53.96 points, or 2.2 percent, to 2,505.03, with the Nasdaq falling 1.5 percent for the week.

Shares of embattled Countrywide Financial Corp. climbed 13.1 percent after the nation’s largest mortgage lender was upgraded to neutral from sell by Banc of America Securities.

Hewlett-Packard Co. advanced 2.4 percent after the tech giant posted a 29 percent jump in third-quarter profits.

Shares of Nordstrom Inc. gained 1.9 percent after trading lower for much of the day after noting in its second-quarter results that it had upped its reserve on bad credit by about $22 million from a year earlier.

Ahead of the opening, the Federal Reserve said it had cut the discount rate to 5.75 percent, while acknowledging the precarious state of credit markets in making the move.

“The Fed’s move was a very positive surprise,” said Owen Fitzpatrick, head of the U.S. equity group at Deutsche Bank. “People will now probably place a high probability of a cut (in the Fed funds rate) in September. It’s a Band-Aid but we still need to get to a point where credit markets are functioning properly.”

U.S. stocks experienced a dramatic reversal in the final hour of trade Thursday, helping the Dow industrials recoup much of a 340-point deficit to finish only slightly lower.