A strong gain in September retail sales sent the markets soaring to a sharply higher close with the Dow leaping 166 points to 11,644. Nasdaq jumped 47 points to 2667.

On the upside

Shares of Ubiquiti Networks (Nasdaq: UBNT) soared on its first trading day.  

Relational Investors and the California State Teachers’ Retirement System each purchased shares in Harman International (NYSE: HAR). 

Shares of USEC (NYSE: USU) surged after rival uranium producer Uranium Energy narrowed losses

On the downside

Level 3 Communications (Nasdaq: LVLT) will announce third quarter results on Wednesday, November 2, 2011.   

Moody’s downgraded Clearwire’s (Nasdaq: CLWR) credit rating.

Oncologist Dr. Mark Ratain expects Keryx Pharmaceuticals’ (Nasdaq: KERX) colon cancer medication perifosine to fail its clinical trial. 

In the broad market, advancing issues outpaced decliners by a margin of nearly 9 to 2 on the NYSE and by 3 to 1 on Nasdaq. The Russell 2000 which tracks small cap stocks surged 13 points to 712.