Toward the end of trading Friday, the Dow traded up 1.5% to 31,388.89 while the NASDAQ rose 1.18% to 12,874.20. The S&P also rose, gaining 1.62% to 3,829.59.
The U.S. has the highest number of coronavirus cases and deaths in the world, reporting a total of 28,827,140 cases with around 520,350 deaths. India confirmed a total of at least 11,173,760 confirmed cases and 157,540 deaths, while Brazil reported over 10,793,730 COVID-19 cases with 260,970 deaths. In total, there were at least 115,618,080 cases of COVID-19 worldwide with over 2,569,420 deaths, according to data compiled by Johns Hopkins University.
Leading and Lagging Sectors
Energy shares rose 3.5% on Friday. Meanwhile, top gainers in the sector included W&T Offshore, Inc. WTI, up 18%, and REX American Resources Corporation REX, up 11%.
In trading on Friday, consumer discretionary shares fell 0.5%.
Top Headline
Big Lots, Inc. BIG reported better-than-expected earnings for its fourth quarter.
Big Lots posted quarterly adjusted earnings of $2.59 per share, beating analysts’ estimates of $2.50 per share. The company reported sales of $1.74 billion, versus expectations of $1.74 billion.
Equities Trading UP
Sify Technologies Limited SIFY shares shot up 69% to $4.57. Blackstone Group is in talks for acquiring a minority stake in India’s ICT service & solution provider Sify Technologies, Bloomberg reported.
Shares of IDT Corporation IDT got a boost, shooting 13% to $18.11 after the company reported an increase in Q2 earnings and sales.
IMAX Corporation IMAX shares were also up, gaining 13% to $23.47 after the company reported better-than-expected Q4 sales.
Check out these big movers of the day
Equities Trading DOWN
Evofem Biosciences, Inc. EVFM shares tumbled 31% to $2.2650 after the company reported worse-than-expected Q4 EPS results.
Shares of Calyxt, Inc. CLXT were down 21% to $7.02 after reporting a loss for the fourth quarter.
IMARA Inc. IMRA was down, falling 24% to $9.35 after reporting a FY20 loss of $3.53 per share.
Commodities
In commodity news, oil traded up 3.3% to $65.94, while gold traded down 0.3% to $1,694.90.
Silver traded down 1.1% Friday to $25.185 while copper rose 2.4% to $4.0735.
Euro zone
European shares closed lower today. The eurozone’s STOXX 600 dropped 0.78%, the Spanish Ibex Index fell 0.8% and the German DAX 30 dropped 0.97%. Meanwhile, the French CAC 40 fell 0.82%, London’s FTSE 100 fell 0.31% and Italy’s FTSE MIB fell 0.55%.
The UK’s Halifax house price index increased 5.2% year-over-year in February. French current account gap increased to EUR 1.6 billion in January from EUR 1.1 billion in December, while trade gap widened to EUR 3.95 billion from EUR 3.57 billion. Factory orders in Germany rose 1.4% in January.
Economics
The US economy added 379,000 jobs in February, while unemployment rate declined to 6.2% in February.
The trade deficit widened to $68.2 billion in January from a revised $67 billion in the prior month.
The total number of active U.S. oil rigs rose by 1 to 310 rigs this week, Baker Hughes Inc reported.
Data on consumer credit for January will be released at 3:00 p.m. ET. Consumer credit is likely to rise $13.0 billion in January from a $9.7 billion increase in December.
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