Booming North American oil production is reshaping world markets and will help satisfy the growing thirst for oil in the developing world, according to the International Energy Agency (IEA). Is sending ripples throughout the world.

IEA Exe Director. Maria van  der Hoeven. " This is helping to ease a market that was relatively tight for several years."

The past 3mths have certainly been a tumultuous time in the forex mkts, but for equity traders, there's hasn't been a better time to be in the markets!, for some investors to believe how stocks could be doing so well given the current state of the global economy, and to understand why investors are buying equities and selling currencies.

While US data has improved, the performance of the US economy has been less than outstanding, and there are plenty of reasons why central banks still view the recovery with skepticism. then, it's this same level of skepticism that has helped equities perform so well b'cos improvement in mkt sentiment is exactly what central banks have been trying to achieve.

Federal Reserve and its counterparts around the world are still engaged in aggressive monetary easing, and in doing so, they are pushing the return in bond investments lower and driving investors into riskier assets like equities.

Combine that with the initial evidence of a stronger US recovery and problems in Europe and we can understand why investors are buying stocks so aggressively.

See also: 4 Catalysts for Renewed Risk Aversion

See related: The New Epicenter for Eurozone Problems

Watch for upbeat U.S. economic data...good news n as well as bad news.

Stocks wrapped up one of the best weeks of the yr. Dow Jones industrial average  & S& P 500 closed higher for the 6th straight trading day and ended the wk up more than +2%.

Investors have been partying like it's 1996. But the mood was slightly less festive Friday as investors questioned whether the rally in stocks has run out of steam.

Related: Betting on boring stocks pays off

The Dow's records come just ahead of the fourth anniversary of the market's bottom following the financial crisis.

1. Protesters in Tokyo demand end to nuclear power

   Thousands of people rallied in a Tokyo park Saturday, demanding an end to atomic power and vowing never to give up the fight, despite two years of little change after the nuclear disaster in northeastern Japan.

   Channel 8 San Diego - 09 Mar 17:35

9:19 am:  How can the U.S. make the most of booming gas and oil production?   More

US manufacturing sector grew at its fastest rate in over a year and a half in Feb, while a separate report showed US construction spending fell.

• For Americans, Income Falls But Spending Goes Up

Data from Japan's Cabinet Office showed the economy contracted at an annual rate of 0.4% from October to December -- a steeper slowdown than economists had expected and the third consecutive quarter of negative growth.