Oil and gold stocks helped lead Bay Street higher Tuesday morning, while Wall Street got a boost from some strong earnings and after oil prices fell back from strong early gains.

At midday, the S&P/TSX was up 31.30 points or 0.35% to 9095.14 after advancing 6.68 points on Monday. The TSX Venture exchange was up slightly, 0.21 points, to 1797.81 after increasing 5.48 points Monday. The Dow Jones was up 47.36 points or 0.45% to 10605.36, reversing a 51-point drop early in the session. The Nasdaq added 11.36 points or 0.54% to 2099.27, while the S&P 500 increased 7.74 points or 0.65% to 1192.26. U.S. markets were closed Monday for the Martin Luther King, Jr. holiday.

The Canadian dollar was down 0.35 of a cent to US81.83¢.

Canadian markets got a boost from oil prices, which hit their highest levels in seven weeks early in the morning, before falling back. The price of light sweet crude on the New York Mercantile Exchange jumped 91¢ to US$49.29 a barrel for the first time since the end of November as colder weather hits the U.S. Northeast. But crude pared its gains, and fell back to rise 67¢ at US$49.05.

The TSX energy subindex was ahead 0.74% as a result. But it was gold shares that lead the markets. They were ahead 2.07% even though the price of bullion slipped. Gold for February delivery was off 60¢ cents at US$422.40 an ounce on the New York Mercantile Exchange’s COMEX division, hardly moving in a tight range of US$424.20 to US$421.40.

All but two subindices — financial, down 0.07% and consumer staples, off 0.65%, were up at noon ET.

Tech stocks were were up 0.79%, lead by Nortel Networks Corp., which was trading 1.54% higher on volume of 8.7 million shares.

Other more active stocks included BCE Inc., which was down 1.73% to $29.57, and Cambior Inc., which jumped 4.01% to $3.11. Alcan Inc. added 1.43% to $48.94.

In New York, U.S. stocks turned higher as a two-week decline in the market and a raft of broadly positive earnings reports sparked some modest buying, although a fresh spike in oil prices continued to be a cause for concern.

Shares of Bank of America Corp edged up 1.18% to US$45.42 after posting a solid fourth quarter, buoyed by the contribution of recently-acquired Fleet Boston and strength in its asset liability management business.

In other news, shares of beleaguered doughnut maker Krispy Kreme got a shot in the arm Monday after the company confirmed the resignation of CEO Scott Livengood. Krispy Kreme said it was also mulling further restructuring of the company, which could include store closing. The doughnut maker’s shares shot up 12.8% to $9.84 in morning trading.

Overseas, Tokyo’s benchmark Nikkei Stock Average of 225 selected issues lost 63.84 points or 0.56% to 11423.26. In Hong Kong, the blue-chip Hang Seng Index slipped 17.43 points or 0.12% to 13604.22.

London’s FTSE 100 index was 37.2 points lower at 4,809.5. Frankfurt’s DAX 30 was off 21.52 points at 4,223.99 while the Paris CAC 40 was 22.69 points lower at 3,858.75.