NEW YORK (AFP) - US stocks Friday vaulted higher as investors shrugged off a report showing poor industrial output last month as mainly weather-related.

At the closing bell, the Dow Jones Industrial Average jumped 126.67 (0.79 per cent) to 16,154.26.

The broad-based S&P 500 rose 8.76 (0.43 per cent) to 1,838.59, while the tech-rich Nasdaq Composite Index tacked on 3.35 (0.08 per cent) to 4,244.03.

US industrial output unexpectedly fell 0.3 per cent in January. But the Federal Reserve said the decline was partly due to "the severe weather that curtailed production in some regions of the country." Sam Stovall, chief investment officer at Standard & Poor's Capital IQ, said investors were confident in the US recovery.

A lot of the weak data "is weather-related," Stovall said. "We will find that as the months move on, the economy will bounce back."