Mid-Afternoon Market Update: Nasdaq Surges 200 Points; Crude Oil Up 1%

U.S. stocks traded higher toward the end of trading, with the Nasdaq gaining 200 points on Friday.

The Dow traded up 0.25% to 34,567.94 while the NASDAQ rose 1.47% to 13,815.56. The S&P also rose, gaining, 0.69% to 4,442.33.

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Leading and Lagging Sectors

Information technology shares climbed by 1.6% on Friday. Meanwhile, top gainers in the sector included StoneCo Ltd. STNE, up 42% and Tuya Inc. TUYA up 34%.

In trading on Friday, utilities shares fell by 0.8%.

Top Headline

U.S. existing home sales dropped by 7.2% to an annualized rate of 6.02 million in February. It is the lowest reading in six months.

Equities Trading UP

Kidpik Corp. PIK shares shot up 38% to $6.54 on continued momentum following the company's recently-announced partnership with The Walt Disney Co.

Shares of StoneCo Ltd. STNE got a boost, shooting 42% to $13.65 after the company reported Q4 earnings results.

UP Fintech Holding Limited TIGR shares were also up, gaining 34% to $5.49. UP Fintech Holding reported fourth-quarter FY21 revenue growth of 31.7% year-on-year to $62.2 million, beating the consensus of $52.8 million.

Equities Trading DOWN

Ambac Financial Group, Inc. AMBC shares tumbled 22% to $9.27 after its subsidiary Ambac Assurance issued a statement on residential mortgage-backed securities litigation.

Shares of BigBear.ai Holdings, Inc. BBAI were down 21% to $6.53 after the company reported Q4 earnings results and issued FY22 sales guidance below estimates.

HTG Molecular Diagnostics, Inc. HTGM was down, falling 19% to $1.72. HTG Molecular Diagnostics reported a $7.5 million private placement.

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Commodities

In commodity news, oil traded up 1.3% to $104.29, while gold traded down 0.8% to $1,927.60.

Silver traded down 2% Friday to $25.095 while copper rose 0.6% to $4.7285.

Euro zone

European shares closed higher today. The eurozone’s STOXX 600 gained 0.91%, London’s FTSE 100 gained 0.26%, while Spain’s IBEX 35 Index rose 0.07%. The German DAX gained 0.17%, French CAC 40 gained 0.12% and Italy’s FTSE MIB Index rose 0.41%.

The trade balance in the Eurozone swung to a deficit of €27.2 billion in January versus a €10.7 billion surplus in the year-ago period. Hourly labor costs in the Eurozone rose 1.9% year-over-year during the fourth quarter.

Italy recorded a trade deficit of EUR 5.052 billion in January versus a year-ago surplus of EUR 1.584 billion, while construction output surged 13.2% year-over-year in January.

Economics

U.S. existing home sales dropped by 7.2% to an annualized rate of 6.02 million in February. It is the lowest reading in six months.

The index of leading economic indicators rose 0.3% for February.

The total number of active U.S. oil rigs slipped by 3 to 524 rigs this week, Baker Hughes Inc reported.

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Check out the full economic calendar here

COVID-19 Update

The U.S. has the highest number of coronavirus cases and deaths in the world, reporting a total of 81,350,880 cases with around 996,070 deaths. India confirmed a total of at least 43,004,000 cases and 516,310 deaths, while Brazil reported over 29,527,640 COVID-19 cases with 656,480 deaths. In total, there were at least 466,663,320 cases of COVID-19 worldwide with more than 6,088,980 deaths.