Nasdaq Down Over 2%; Walgreens Posts Upbeat Results

U.S. stocks traded lower midway through trading, with the Nasdaq Composite falling over 400 points on Friday.

The Dow traded down 1.64% to 41,935.30 while the NASDAQ dipped 2.15% to 19,060.79. The S&P 500 also fell, dropping, 1.77% to 5,813.73.

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Leading and Lagging Sectors

Energy shares rose by 0.6% on Friday.

In trading on Friday, information technology shares tumbled by 2.1%.

Top Headline

On Friday, Walgreens Boots Alliance Inc WBA reported better-than-expected first-quarter results.

The company posted quarterly sales of $39.46 billion, up 7.5% year over year (+6.9% on constant currency), beating the consensus of $37.28 billion, reflecting sales growth across all segments.

Adjusted EPS was 51 cents, down from 66 cents a year ago, beating the consensus of 37 cents, according to data from Benzinga Pro.

Equities Trading UP

Conduit Pharmaceuticals Inc CDT shares shot up 52% to $0.12.
Shares of Vision Marine Technologies Inc VMARgot a boost, surging 72% to $2.62 as it regained compliance with Nasdaq's minimum stockholders' equity requirement, which it previously failed to meet. Vision Marine partnered with Calip Group to produce advanced cooling plates for electric boat batteries.
DatChat Inc DATS shares were also up, gaining 107% to $6.63 after the company announced the pricing of a $5.1 million registered direct offering priced at-the-market under Nasdaq rules.

Equities Trading DOWN

IGM Biosciences Inc IGMS shares dropped 69% to $1.94 after the company announced it is halting further development of Imvotamab and IGM-2644.
Shares of XTI Aerospace Inc XTIA were down 54% to $5.82. XTI Aerospace recently announced a $20 million offering of 363,636,364 shares at $0.055 per share.
22nd Century Group Inc XXII was down, falling 39% to $4.97.

Commodities

In commodity news, oil traded up 2.4% to $75.67 while gold traded up 1% at $2,716.70.

Silver traded up 1% to $31.315 on Friday, while copper fell 0.2% to $4.2995.

Euro zone

European shares were lower today. The eurozone's STOXX 600 declined 0.79%, Germany's DAX 40 fell 0.44% and France's CAC 40 dipped 0.85%. Spain's IBEX 35 Index fell 1.43%, while London's FTSE 100 slipped 0.83%.

Asia Pacific Markets

Asian markets closed lower on Friday, with Japan's Nikkei 225 falling 1.05%, China's Shanghai Composite Index dipping 1.33%, Hong Kong's Hang Seng Index declining 0.92% and India's BSE Sensex falling 0.31%.

Economics

Nonfarm payrolls rose by 256,000 last month, up from the downwardly revised 212,000 in November and sharply surpassing economist expectations of 160,000 payrolls as tracked by TradingEconomics.
The unemployment rate fell from 4.2% to 4.1%, beating forecasts of an unchanged reading.
Average hourly earnings rose 0.3% month-over-month in December, matching expectations but slowing from November's 0.4%. On a year-over-year basis, wages increased 3.9%, slightly below of the 4% forecast.

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