February 9, 2018: Markets opened higher Friday but spent most of the day trading in the red By late afternoon all three major indexes managed to push into the green for a short time. Regardless of where markets close this afternoon, equities will have lost about 8% this week.
WTI crude oil for March delivery settled at $59.20 a barrel, down 3.2% for the day and down nearly 10% for the week. The rig count soared this week, pushing prices below $59 briefly. April gold dropped about 0.3% on the day to settle at $1,315.70. Equities were headed for a higher close close about 15 minutes before the bell as the DJIA traded up 1.22% for the day, the S&P 500 traded up 1.27%, and the Nasdaq Composite traded up 1.26%.
Bitcoin futures (XBTG8) for February delivery traded at $8,600, up about 3.9% on the CBOE after opening at $8,200 this morning. The digital currency’s trading range for the day was $7,700 to $8,730.
The DJIA stock posting the largest daily percentage gain ahead of the close Friday was Nike Inc. (NYSE: NKE) which traded up 4.08%% at $65.04. The stock’s 52-week range is $50.35 to $68.83. Volume was about 40% above the daily average of around 9 million shares. The company had no specific news.
American Express Co. (NYSE: AXP) traded up 3.21%% at $91.18. The stock’s 52-week range is $75.51 to $102.39. Volume was around 6.1 million shares, nearly double the daily average of about 3.6 million. The company had no specific news Friday.
Microsoft Corp. (NASDAQ: MSFT) traded up 3.03% at $87.59. The stock’s 52-week range is $63.62 to $96.07. Volume was about double the daily average of around 26.7 million shares. The company had no specific news Friday.
General Electric Co. (NYSE: GE) traded up 2.77% at $14.85. The stock’s 52-week range is $14.23 to $30.59, and the low was posted this afternoon. Volume was about 10% above the daily average of around 91.6 million. The company declared its $0.12 quarterly dividend this afternoon.
Of the Dow stocks, 20 are on track to close higher Friday and 10 are set to close lower.
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