Mid-Morning Market Update: Gold Futures See Sharp Decline, Ubiquity Networks Reports Growth for Second Straight Quarter

Following the market opening Friday, the Dow traded up 0.13 percent to 15,102.64, while the NASDAQ gained 0.42 percent to reach 3,423.62. The S&P also rose, increasing 0.20 percent to 1,629.90.

Gold futures saw a sharp decline on Friday, on the back of the extended rally of the US dollar against the Japanese Yen. Gold futures for June fell by almost $40 to $1,428.70 an ounce on the Comex Index of the New York Mercantile Exchange. BNP Paribas has downgraded its gold price outlook, while saying that the precious metal is likely to trade once again above $1,600 per ounce within the next six months.

Ubiquity Networks, Inc

shot up, gaining 20.55 percent to $19.42. Ubiquity Networks reported its Fiscal Q3 results with a second straight quarter of double-digit sequential growth. Molycorp, Inc

was also up 20.39 percent to $6.73 after Molycorp beat analyst expectations with its Q1 results. Shares of Tesla Motors, Inc

got a boost, shooting up 12.54 percent to $78.10. Tesla Motors benefitted from its heavily shorted stock.

Pain Therapeutics, Inc

was down, falling 47.930 percent to $2.77, after Pfizer

announced that it was re-evaluating its endorsement of the Remoxy program following the “years of delay, additional cost incurred to bring the program to this point and development work left in the program.” Shares of DURECT Corporation

were down 142.10 percent to $0.92, following DURECT's update on Remoxy. DRRX announced that Pfizer

does not expect to submit a response to the “complete response” letter any time before mid-2015. Institutional Financial Markets, Inc

shares tumbled 33.26 percent to $1.87 after the company its Q1 2013 results with adjusted operating loss of $5.6 million.

In commodity news, oil traded down2.15 percent to $45.32, while gold dropped 2.61 percent to $1,430.30. Silver traded down 2.60 percent Friday to $23.29, while copper fell 0.12 percent to $3.34.

European shares were also higher overnight on the back of Asian strength. The Spanish Ibex Index rose 0.34 percent and the Italian FTSE MIB Index rose 1.23 percent. Meanwhile, the German DAX gained 0.53 percent and the French CAC 40 added 0.51 percent while U.K. shares gained 0.34 percent.

Chairman of the Federal Reserve, Ben Bernanke, was schedule to speak at the Chicago Federeal Banking Conference on Friday morning. The monthly budget report for March by the US Treasury stood at $106.5 billion, representing a deficit. So far, 2013 has witnessed an improvement in the government's deficit, which now stands at a whopping $600.5 billion. This figure represents a 23% decline six months into the year. Esther George, President of the Kansas City Federal Reserve Bank is schedule to speak on the economy in Jackson, Wyoming at 2:00pm.