Mid-Day Market Update: Nasdaq Rises 1%; BigBear.ai Shares Plunge

U.S. stocks traded mostly higher midway through trading, with the Nasdaq adding 1% on Friday.

The Dow traded down 0.17% to 34,420.54 while the NASDAQ rose 1.07% to 13,761.01. The S&P also rose, gainng, 0.29% to 4,424.35.

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Leading and Lagging Sectors

Information technology shares climbed by 1% on Friday. Meanwhile, top gainers in the sector included StoneCo Ltd. STNE, up 41% and Tuya Inc. TUYA up 37%.

In trading on Friday, utilities shares fell by 0.9%.

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 42% to $6.73 on continued momentum following the company's recently-announced partnership with The Walt Disney Co.

Shares of StoneCo Ltd. STNE got a boost, shooting 41% to $13.53 after the company reported Q4 earnings results.

UP Fintech Holding Limited TIGR shares were also up, gaining 33% to $5.46. 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 23% to $9.14 after its subsidiary Ambac Assurance issued a statement on residential mortgage-backed securities litigation.

Shares of BigBear.ai Holdings, Inc. BBAI were down 22% to $6.48 after the company reported Q4 earnings results and issued FY22 sales guidance below estimates.

HTG Molecular Diagnostics, Inc. HTGM was down, falling 17% to $1.75. HTG Molecular Diagnostics reported a $7.5 million private placement.

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Commodities

In commodity news, oil traded up 1.1% to $104.08, while gold traded down 0.6% to $1,932.40.

Silver traded down 1.7% Friday to $25.17 while copper rose 0.8% to $4.7395.

Euro zone

European shares were mostly lower today. The eurozone’s STOXX 600 gained 0.7%, London’s FTSE 100 gained 0.11%, while Spain’s IBEX 35 Index fell 0.24%. The German DAX declined 0.19%, French CAC 40 slipped 0.07% and Italy’s FTSE MIB Index fell 0.13%.

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 Baker Hughes North American rig count report for the latest week is scheduled for release at 1:00 p.m. ET.

Chicago Fed President Charles Evans will speak at 2:00 p.m. ET.

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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.