The U.S. stock market continues its rally on Wednesday, boosted by encouraging U.S. economic data and a surging basic materials sector.

The S&P 500 Index is up 4.43 points, or 0.40 percent, to trade at 1,122.74 at 10:44 am. The Dow Jones Industrial Average is up 42.32 points, or 0.41 percent, to trade at 10,448.30.

The Dow Jones U.S. Basic Materials Index gained 1.48 percent. Freeport-McMoRan (NYSE:FCX) gained 2.37 percent and Goldcorp (NYSE:GG) gained 2.37 percent.

The American Depository Receipts (ADRs) of foreign firms traded even higher. BHP Billiton (NYSE:BBL) is up 3.46 percent, Vale (NYSE:VALE) is up 1.95 percent, and Rio Tinto (NYSE:RTP) jumped 3.65 percent.

At 8:15 am EST, ADP, a private firm, released its U.S. employment report, which showed that non-farm private payrolls decreased 20,000 in February.

The figure is in-line with the median forecast of economists surveyed by Bloomberg. It also showed the fewest monthly job cuts since February 2008.

ADP expects the U.S. government's employment report, scheduled to be released on Friday, to be skewed because of the recent heavy snow in the east coast. Its own data, however, is not significantly impacted by the weather due to methodology used to construct it.

Its claimed accuracy heightens the importance of the report ahead of Thursday's unemployment claims and Friday's report which includes non-farm payroll changes and the unemployment rate.

At 10:00 am EST, the Institute for Supply Management released its Non-Manufacturing PMI which showed a reading of 53.0 for February, up from 50.5 last month. That beat forecasts of 51.0, according to economists surveyed by Bloomberg.

A reading above 50.0 indicates expanding activities in the services sector.

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