The market on Friday
U.S. stock indices were trending higher again Friday morning as the week will end with one day of fourth-quarter earnings reports.
Today's morning reports include reports from Regeneron Pharmaceuticals, Bristol-Myers Squibb, Royal Caribbean Cruises and Aon.
The technology-focused Nasdaq composite fell 3.7%, the biggest drop since September 2020, closing at 13,878.82. The Dow Jones Industrial Average, which does not include metaplatforms, fell 1.5% to 35,111.16 points.
Shares of smaller companies also fell. The Russell 2000 index lost 38.48 points, or 1.9 per cent, to 1991.03 points.
The social network Twitter, which fell 5.6 per cent, suffered a sharp fall. Snapchat's parent company Snap fell 23.6% and Pinterest fell 10.3%. Snap soared 54% and Pinterest climbed 28% after the sale after each reported better-than-expected results. Amazon jumped 18% in after-hours trading after posting strong fourth-quarter results, despite supply chain issues.
Large technology and communications companies have played a big part in boosting profits for the broader market throughout the pandemic and much of the recovery in 2021. other high value growth stocks are relatively less attractive.
The major Wall Street indices continue to show weekly gains, helped by strong earnings reports from companies such as Apple, ExxonMobil, UPS and Google's parent company Alphabet.
In other trading, US benchmark crude rose 40 cents to $90.67 a gallon after rising $2.01 to $90.27 a gallon on Thursday.
Brent crude, which is the basis for oil pricing worldwide, rose 28 cents to $91.39 a gallon.
