Stocks rose as investors capped a capricious week by engaging in a bit of Black Friday bargain hunting while awaiting word of how retailers might fare during what is expected to be a tough holiday shopping season.
Friday's holiday-shortened session ended three hours early and followed fractious trading that on Wednesday saw the Dow Jones industrial average and the Standard & Poor's 500 index give up more than 1.5 percent. The S&P's climb on Friday put the index back into positive territory for the year.
The day after Thanksgiving, Black Friday, which marks the kickoff of the holidays shopping season, is so named because it historically was when stores turned a profit.
The day's gains weren't enough to reverse losses for the week, however, and observers cautioned the session could prove more an aberration than a reversal of recent trends. With many of Wall Street's principal players on vacation, volume was light as is typical on such days.
"While I'd love to celebrate this rally, it is on very thin volume and we have to really wait until next week to get a sense of the true direction of this market," said Jack Ablin, chief investment officer at Harris Private Bank in Chicago.
Still, he said it's a good sign that stocks didn't extend Wednesday's slide.
"It looks like a little rebound rally," Ablin said. "Maybe the day off for Thanksgiving enabled investors to reflect that maybe the bottom isn't falling out of the economy."
The Dow rose 181.84, or 1.42 percent, to 12,980.88, finishing at the highs of the session rather than losing steam in the final minutes as has occurred often in recent weeks.
Broader stock indicators also rose. The Standard & Poor's 500 index advanced 23.93, or 1.69 percent, to 1,440.70, and the NASDAQ composite index rose 34.45, or 1.34 percent, to 2,596.60.
For the week, the Dow lost 1.49 percent, the S&P slid 1.24 percent and the NASDAQ gave up 1.54 percent.
Government bonds showed little movement. The yield on the 10-year Treasury note, which moves inversely to its price, stood at 4.01 percent, flat with late Wednesday.
The dollar was lower against other major currencies, while gold prices rose.
With no major economic data arriving and not much in the way of corporate news, some investors appeared to make some pro forma trades and search for any insights into the health of the economy, particularly with the arrival of Black Friday.
Oil prices, which flirted with US$100 per barrel earlier in the week, gained as heating oil rose amid concerns about tightening supplies. Light, sweet crude for January delivery advanced US$0.89 to settle at US$98.18 per barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange.
Friday's advance came after the S&P 500 on Wednesday slipped into negative territory for the year -- unwelcome news as many investments such as mutual funds mirror the index. By Friday, however, the S&P had rebounded and was up 1.58 percent for the year.
The stock market's recent swoon is owed in part to concerns about the health of the banking sector and how it will emerge from a recent string of write-offs on soured subprime loans, which are those made to borrowers with poor credit. Banks have announced about US$75 billion in writedowns for the third and fourth quarters.
Ron Kiddoo, chief investment officer at Cozad Asset Management in Champaign, Illinois, said Wall Street needs a dose of good news such as continued strength in the job market to shed its sense of anxiety.
Analysts view a robust labor market as crucial to upholding strong consumer spending.
Financial stocks, which have seen steep selloffs in recent weeks showed gains on Friday. Some of the concern came after goverment-sponsored mortgage-makers Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae reported huge quarterly losses in recent weeks.
Among retailers drawing Wall Street's attention on Black Friday, Circuit City Stores Inc. jumped US$1.06, or 19.5 percent, to US$6.51, while Target Corp. climbed US$3.07, or 5.7 percent, to US$57.17. Wal-Mart Stores Inc, the world's largest retailer, rose US$0.87 to US$45.73.
Advancing issues outnumbered decliners by about 5 to 1 on the New York Stock Exchange, where volume came to 670.4 million shares.
The Russell 2000 index of smaller companies rose 14.73, or 1.99 percent, to 755.03.
Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) yesterday obtained the government’s approval to inject an additional US$7.5 billion into its US subsidiary, the Department of Investment Review said in a statement. The department approved TSMC’s application of investing in TSMC Arizona Corp, which is engaged in the manufacturing, sales, testing and design of IC and other semiconductor devices, it said. The latest capital injection follows a US$5 billion investment for TSMC Arizona approved in June. The chipmaker has broken ground on two advanced fabs in Arizona with aggregated investments approved by the department totaling US$24 billion thus far. According to TSMC, the first Arizona
The lethal hack of Hezbollah’s Asian-branded pagers and walkie-talkies has sparked an intense search for the devices’ path, revealing a murky market for older technologies where buyers might have few assurances about what they are getting. While supply chains and distribution channels for higher-margin and newer products are tightly managed, that is not the case for older electronics from Asia where counterfeiting, surplus inventories and complex contract manufacturing deals can sometimes make it impossible to identify the source of a product, analysts and consultants say. The response from the companies at the center of the booby-trapped gadgets that killed 37
FRIENDLY TAKEOVER: While Qualcomm Inc’s proposal to buy some or all of Intel raises the prospect of other competitors, Broadcom Inc is staying on the sidelines Qualcomm Inc has approached Intel Corp to discuss a potential acquisition of the struggling chipmaker, people with knowledge of the matter said, raising the prospect of one of the biggest-ever merger and acquisition deals. California-based Qualcomm proposed a friendly takeover for Intel in recent days, said the sources, who asked not to be identified discussing confidential information. The proposal is for all of the chipmaker, although Qualcomm has not ruled out buying some parts of Intel and selling off others. It is uncertain whether the initial approach would lead to an agreement and any deal is likely to come under close antitrust scrutiny
SECURITY CONCERNS: The proposed ban on Chinese autonomous vehicle software and hardware would go into effect with the 2027 and 2030 model years respectively The US Department of Commerce today is expected to propose prohibiting Chinese software and hardware in connected and autonomous vehicles on US roads due to national security concerns, two sources said. US President Joe Biden’s administration has raised concerns about the collection of data by Chinese companies on US drivers and infrastructure as well as the potential foreign manipulation of vehicles connected to the Internet and navigation systems. The proposed regulation would ban the import and sale of vehicles from China with key communications or automated driving system software or hardware, said the two sources, who declined to be identified because the