Week Ends With Bank Stocks Snapping Two-Day Rally – Acadiana Business Index

The major averages finished mixed on Friday. Ken Meyers has your stock market report on the Acadiana Business Index.

• The Dow was down less than 5 points to close virtually unchanged at 15543. The S&P 500 Index finished marginally higher, rising just less than 3 points to 1692. The NASDAQ fell over 23 points to 3587.
• Weak earnings results from the Technology sector caused stocks to take a breather. Google fell 1.6% to $895.77 and Microsoft dropped 11.6% to $31.33 after both tech giants delivered disappointing second-quarter profit tallies.
• Financials also lagged behind as bank stocks snapped a two-day rally. JPMorgan was down 0.4% to $56.14 and Citigroup lost 0.6% to $52.38.
• Gains in Health Care helped limit losses thanks to Johnson & Johnson’s 2.1% advance to $92.08.
• Industrials also finished higher as an encouraging earnings report from General Electric pushed its shares up 4.9% to $24.81.
• Overall, the retreat among tech companies pushed the NASDAQ into negative territory for the week with a loss of nearly 0.4%. However, the Dow held onto a weekly advance of 0.5% and the S&P 500 increased 0.7% marking their fourth consecutive week of positive returns.
• NYSE Composite volume totaled over 3.2 billion shares. The NYSE was even on issues and 9-7 positive on volume. The NASDAQ was also even issues, but 3-2 negative on volume.
• In fixed-income, Treasuries increased Friday and posted back-to-back weekly gains. The 10-year note was up 13/32 to yield 2.48% and the 30-year bond gained over a full point to yield 3.56%.

For the complete economic report, click Ken's Market Report.