(New York) The New York Stock Exchange closed on a mixed note Friday, with technology catching its breath after the Nvidia-related surge the day before, but stock market momentum helped the Dow Jones and S&P 500 narrowly surpass new records.
The Dow Jones index advanced 0.16% to 39,131.53 points, a new historic high after that of the day before. The S&P 500 nibbled 0.03% to 5088.80 points, also very close to a new high. The technology-dominated NASDAQ returned 0.28% to 15,996.82 points.
“In the absence of macroeconomic news on Friday, the euphoria linked to Nvidia” – the specialist in chips for artificial intelligence which had posted brilliant results on Wednesday evening, generating overwhelming enthusiasm from investors on the stock market on Thursday –, “ generated positive momentum that has continued,” commented Spartan Capital analyst Peter Cardillo.
“The craze for artificial intelligence has helped reach new highs,” he added, although the technology sector has cooled down a bit after the NASDAQ soared almost 3%. the day before, one of the best sessions of this index in a year.
On Thursday, Nvidia’s stock jumped 16%, swelling the group’s market valuation from $277 billion to nearly $2,000 billion, placing it in third place of the “Magnificent Seven”, behind Microsoft. and Apple.
On Friday, Nvidia shares ended slightly up 0.36% at $788.17.
Several big names in tech, however, lost ground such as microprocessor manufacturer AMD (-2.94%), Tesla (-2.76%) and Apple (-1%).
Of the eleven S&P sectors, seven finished in the green, including utilities (+0.71%), materials (+0.58%) and industrial stocks (+0.50%).
Energy (-0.58%) was the worst performer, while crude prices fell sharply on Friday.
The bond market eased slightly, with rates on 10-year Treasury bills rising to 4.24% around 4:35 p.m. ET, from 4.32% the day before.
On the value side, the Block payment services group (Cash App, Square) climbed 16.13%, to $78.92, after announcing quarterly turnover up to $5.77 billion. and an operating profit of 2.03 billion.
Travel reservation site Booking saw its stock fall 10.15%, as its forecasts for the current first quarter disappointed the market, even if its results for the fourth quarter of 2023 were better than expected.
Online car seller Carvana soared 32.09% to $69.23, a one-year high. The company, which experienced a difficult last year, managed to record its first annual profit. Carvana is optimistic about its sales in the current first quarter.
The electric vehicle manufacturer Rivian continued to lose ground (-12.05%), after an abysmal fall the day before following the announcement of a disappointing production volume for this year.
Investors took Intuitive Machines to the moon (+15.82% to $9.59), after the Texan company managed to place a probe on the Earth’s natural satellite, the first moon landing by an American device in a half century.
Next week, results from videoconferencing specialist Zoom and those from Salesforce client software are expected.
The Toronto Stock Exchange closed up almost 100 points
The Toronto Stock Exchange closed up nearly 100 points on Friday, while U.S. markets generally managed to hold on to Thursday’s gains.
The Toronto trading floor’s S&P/TSX Composite Index closed up 95.07 points, at 21,413.15 points.
On the currency market, the Canadian dollar traded at 74.11 US cents, the same average rate as Thursday.
The Canadian Press