US STOCKS-Wall St climbs on Fed expectations; Tesla tumbles

* Tesla drops after results, outlook

* Barracuda Networks jumps in debut

* Ralph Lauren climbs after earnings, dividend boost

* Indexes up: Dow 0.65 pct, S&P 0.50 pct, Nasdaq 0.18 pct

By Chuck Mikolajczak

NEW YORK, Nov 6 (Reuters) - U.S. stocks rose on Wednesday on hopes the Federal Reserve will keep its stimulus measures in place longer than anticipated and amid a flurry of new public offerings.

John Williams, president of the San Francisco Federal Reserve Bank, in concurrence with recent statements of central bankers, said Tuesday the Fed should wait for stronger evidence of economic momentum before pulling back on its massive bond-buying program.

The equity market was also buoyed by a host of initial public offerings, with six new issues expected to start trading Wednesday, a day ahead of the highly anticipated IPO of Twitter Inc. Barracuda Networks Inc shares jumped 27.1 percent to $22.88 early on its first trading day.

According to Thomson Reuters (Frankfurt: 864655 - news) data, if all 13 scheduled IPOs price this week, it will be the busiest week of the year in terms of number of primary issues, as well as the most brisk week since September 2007.

"One of the barometers for the health of market conditions we look at is the ability for the market to absorb a large amount of IPOs," said Art Hogan, managing director at Lazard Capital Markets in New York.

The Dow Jones industrial average rose 101.66 points or 0.65 percent, to 15,719.88, the S&P 500 gained 8.76 points or 0.5 percent, to 1,771.73 and the Nasdaq Composite added 6.969 points or 0.18 percent, to 3,946.833.

Tesla Motors Inc (Xetra: A1CX3T - news) shares slumped 11.9 percent to $155.75 after the electric car maker forecast a weaker-than-expected fourth-quarter profit and its third-quarter Model S deliveries disappointed some analysts.

Ralph Lauren Corp shares advanced 4.2 percent to $178.46 after the designer clothing company raised the lower end of its full-year sales forecast on the expectation of strong gains during the holiday quarter, and increased its dividend.

S&P companies expected to report Wednesday include Qualcomm (TLO: QC-U.TI - news) Inc and Whole Foods Market Inc (NasdaqGS: WFM - news) .

Adding to speculation about a more dovish Fed, two of the Federal Reserve's top staff economists made the case in new research papers for more aggressive action by the U.S. central bank to drive down unemployment by promising to hold interest rates lower for longer.

Many market participants anticipate that the Fed will hold off on scaling back its $85 billion monthly bond purchases until next year, on expectations the partial government shutdown in early October has dented the economy. However, some feel the market will be able to absorb a tapering of stimulus in December.

"To the extent that what has changed about the Fed - interest rates may be lower longer, even in an environment of tapering quantitative easing, which is, at best, a neutral, but it's not a negative," said Hogan.

The Conference Board said Wednesday its Leading Economic Index rose 0.7 percent to 97.1 in September, slightly above the 0.6 percent estimate, suggesting some momentum in the economy before last month's partial shutdown of the federal government.