Mid-Afternoon Market Update: NASDAQ Down Over 1%; SkyWest Shares Jump On Earnings Beat

Toward the end of trading Friday, the Dow traded down 0.80 percent to 17,688.11 while the NASDAQ declined 1.08 percent to 4,753.26. The S&P also fell, dropping 1.03 percent to 2,054.39. Leading and Lagging Sectors On Friday, the basic materials sector proved to be a source of strength for the market. Leading the sector was strength from Clearwater Paper Corp CLW and Barrick Gold Corporation (USA) ABX. In trading on Friday, healthcare shares fell by 1.89 percent. Meanwhile, top losers in the sector included Molina Healthcare, Inc. MOH, down 20 percent, and Cepheid CPHD, down 20 percent. Top Headline Exxon Mobil Corporation XOM better-than-expected earnings for the first quarter on Friday. Exxon Mobil's quarterly earnings plunged 63.3 percent to $0.43 a share from $1.17 a share in the same quarter last year. However, the earnings came in $0.12 a share more than the Street analysts' expectations of $0.31 a share. Exxon Mobil's revenue dropped 28 percent to $48.71 billion from $67.62 billion in the year-ago quarter. Yet, it topped the street analysts' expectations of $48.14 billion. Equities Trading UP SkyWest, Inc. SKYW shares shot up 16 percent to $23.40 as the company reported stronger-than-expected Q1 results. Shares of Amazon.com, Inc. AMZN got a boost, shooting up 9 percent to $654.89 after the company reported upbeat results for the first quarter on Thursday. The company posted quarterly EPS of $1.07 and revenue of $29.13 billion, both beating the Street's expectation by $0.49 and $1.15 billion, respectively. B&G Foods, Inc. BGS shares were also up, gaining 20 percent to $40.24 after the company reported better-than-expected Q1 earnings and issued a strong earnings forecast for FY16. Equities Trading DOWN Bottomline Technologies EPAY shares dropped 20 percent to $24.30 as the company reported downbeat quarterly revenue. Raymond James downgraded Bottomline Technologies from Outperform to Market Perform. Shares of ImmunoGen, Inc. IMGN were down 17 percent to $6.99 as the company reported a wider-than-expected Q3 loss and lowered its FY16 revenue guidance. Stericycle Inc SRCL was down, falling around 22 percent to $95.47 after the company reported weaker-than-expected earnings for its first quarter. RBC Capital downgraded Stericycle from Sector Perform to Underperform. Commodities In commodity news, oil traded down 1.13 percent to $45.51 while gold traded up 2.12 percent to $1,293.20. Silver traded up 1.35 percent Friday to $17.83, while copper rose 2.13 percent to $2.28. Eurozone European shares closed lower today. The eurozone's STOXX 600 declined 2.13 percent, the Spanish Ibex Index fell 2.62 percent, while Italy's FTSE MIB Index slipped 1.98 percent. Meanwhile, the German DAX dropped 2.73 percent, and the French CAC 40 dipped 2.82 percent, while U.K. shares fell 1.27 percent. Economics Consumer spending rose 0.1 percent in March, versus economists' expectations for a 0.2 percent growth. Income increased 0.4 percent last month. The employment cost index increased 0.6 percent for the first quarter. The Chicago PMI dropped to 50.4 for April, versus a prior reading of 53.60. However, economists were expecting a reading of 53.00. The University of Michigan's consumer sentiment index slipped to 89.00 in April, versus a prior reading of 89.70. However, economists were expecting a reading of 90.00.