NEW YORK, Nov. 5 (Xinhua) -- Wall Street rallied on Thursday after the U.S. government reported better-than-expected jobless claims and productivity numbers and Cisco posted strong sales.

    The U.S. Labor Department said initial jobless claims dropped by 20,000 to 512,000 last week, the fewest since January, from 532,000 the prior week, a sign job losses are slowing as the economy begins to recover.

    The Labor Department also reported that the measure of employee output per hour jumped at a 9.5 percent annual rate in the third quarter, the fastest pace in six years and topping the highest estimate.

    Cisco, the biggest maker of networking equipment, gained over 2percent after earnings topped estimates and the company said a global economic recovery spurred a rebound in sales.

    Costco Wholesale Corp. rose near 1 percent after the companies reported bigger-than-expected sales.

    The Dow Jones rose 204.80, or 2.09 percent, to 10,006.94. Broader indexes also went higher. The Standard & Poor's 500 index rose 20.13, or 1.92 percent, to 1,066.63 and the Nasdaq climbed 49.80, or 2.42 percent, to 2,099.07.