WASHINGTON (dpa-AFX) - U.S. stocks closed higher on Friday, with investors reacting to another batch of earnings updates, and digesting the non-farm payrolls data for the month of January.
Among the major averages, the Dow edged lower by 21.42 points or 0.06 percent to 35,089.74. The S&P 500 advanced 23.09 points or 0.52 percent to 4,500.53, while the Nasdaq climbed 219.19 points or 1.58 percent to settle at 14,098.01.
The Nasdaq gained nearly 2.5 percent in the week, while the Dow and the S&P 500 gained 1.1 percent and 1.5 percent, respectively.
The tech-laden Nasdaq rebounded today thanks to strong earnings news from Amazon that lifted the stock's price up by a hefty 13.5 percent, the biggest single-session gain in about six years.
Shares of social media company Snap Inc. skyrocketed nearly 14.5 percent, lifted by strong earnings. Pinterest soared more than 11 percent.
Salesforce.com, JP Morgan Chase and Goldman Sachs gained 2.5 to 3 percent. Microsoft, Walt Disney, Chevron and American Express also posted impressive gains.
3M, Wallgreens Boots Alliance, P&G, Home Depot, Visa, Walmart and Coca-Cola were among the notable losers.
The Labor Department said employment jumped by 467,000 jobs in January compared to economist estimates for an increase of 150,000 jobs.
The report also showed the increase in employment in December was upwardly revised to 510,000 jobs compared to the previously reported 199,000 jobs.
Meanwhile, the Labor Department said the unemployment rate inched up to 4.0 percent in January from 3.9 percent in December. Economists had expected the unemployment rate to hold unchanged.
Expectations for more aggressive tightening by the Federal Reserve lifted bond yields. The yield on long term U.S. 10-year Treasury note rose about the 1.9% mark for the first time in more than two years.
In overseas trading, Asian stocks ended broadly higher on Friday, as strong earnings from the likes of Amazon, Snap Inc. and Pinterest helped investors shrug off a tech-led selloff on Wall Street overnight following disappointing earnings from Facebook parent Meta in the wake of privacy changes by Apple and increased competition from TikTok.
European stocks closed lower on Friday with investors continuing to digest the monetary policy announcements from the Bank of England and the European Central Bank, and on concerns about looming interest rate hikes.
The jump in U.S. non-farm payroll employment has raised concerns that the Fed will be resorting to a faster pace of monetary tightening than earlier thought.
The pan European Stoxx 600 dropped 1.38 percent, Germany's DAX declined 1.75 percent, and France's CAC 40 drifted down 0.77 percent, while the U.K.'s FTSE 100 edged down 0.17 percent.
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