By Lewis Krauskopf

NEW YORK, Dec 12 (Reuters) – A host of delayed employment, inflation and other data in the coming week will give a long-anticipated view of the U.S. economy that could help guide markets into year-end.

The S&P 500 ended on Thursday at an all-time closing high, as a third-straight strong year for the ‍benchmark U.S. stock index is nearly in the books. A dovish Federal Reserve meeting on Wednesday cheered investors, although a disappointing report from cloud-computing giant Oracle weighed on the heavyweight tech sector on Thursday.

Investors have been lacking the typical evidence they use to gauge the health of the economy because a 43-day federal government shutdown postponed or canceled key reports, and some of those delayed releases arrive in the week ahead. The U.S.

See Full Page