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    Wall St ends mixed in truncated Black Friday trading

    Synopsis

    The S&P 500 closed nominally higher, while the Dow eked out a modest gain. The Nasdaq was dragged slightly lower by weakness in megacap momentum stocks.

    Wall St ends mixed in truncated Black Friday tradingAP
    U.S. stocks ended little changed in holiday-shortened trading on Friday, with low volume and conviction as investors watched the start of the seasonal shopping season for signs of consumer resiliency.

    The S&P 500 closed nominally higher, while the Dow eked out a modest gain. The Nasdaq was dragged slightly lower by weakness in megacap momentum stocks.

    All three indexes notched their fourth consecutive weekly gains.

    "We had mixed macroeconomic data and the post-Thanksgiving session is only half a day, so there aren't that many participants," said Peter Cardillo, chief market economist at Spartan Capital Securities in New York. "But we're seeing a market that's on the right path of a year-end rally."

    Retailers around the world were attempting to attract millions of shoppers, many offering steep "Black Friday" discounts the day after the U.S. Thanksgiving holiday.

    "Consumers are being very frugal and while they might spend, they're looking for bargains," Cardillo added. "The higher cost of money is hitting consumers' pocketbook."

    A survey by NRF, a U.S. retail trade group, showed U.S. shoppers are planning to spend an average of $875 on holiday purchases this year, an annual increase of about 5%.

    S&P Global's advance purchasing managers' index (PMI) showed steady U.S. business activity in November, but private sector employment declined for the first time in almost 3-1/2 years, possibly due to the Federal Reserve's restrictive monetary policy.

    Next week's most anticipated data include the Commerce Department's second estimate on third-quarter gross domestic product on Thursday, followed on Friday by its wide-ranging Personal Consumption Expenditures (PCE) report, which will provide further clues on the extent of the Fed's rate-hike impact.

    The focus has increasingly shifted to the likely timing of the U.S. central bank's first rate cut, which will be largely determined by the rate at which inflation cools down toward the Fed's average 2% target.

    New and pending home sales, home prices, consumer prices and ISM PMI are also expected next week.

    The Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 117.12 points, or 0.33%, to 35,390.15, the S&P 500 gained 2.72 points, or 0.06%, at 4,559.34 and the Nasdaq Composite dropped 15.00 points, or 0.11%, to 14,250.86.

    Of the 11 major sectors in the S&P 500, nine ended with gains, led by healthcare. Communication services and tech closed in the red.



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    (What's moving Sensex and Nifty Track latest market news, stock tips, Budget 2024 and expert advice, on ETMarkets. Also, ETMarkets.com is now on Telegram. For fastest news alerts on financial markets, investment strategies and stocks alerts, subscribe to our Telegram feeds .)

    Subscribe to The Economic Times Prime and read the Economic Times ePaper Online.and Sensex Today.

    Top Trending Stocks: SBI Share Price, Axis Bank Share Price, HDFC Bank Share Price, Infosys Share Price, Wipro Share Price, NTPC Share Price

    ...more
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