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franckreporter
U.S. stocks on Friday pushed higher, helped by a rally in shares of Netflix after the streaming giant reported strong results. Investors also parsed the latest comments from Federal Reserve speakers before the central bank goes into its blackout period.
By afternoon, the tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite (COMP.IND) had advanced 1.54% to 11,019.62 points, buoyed by a nearly 7% jump in Netflix (NFLX). The company posted healthy gains in quarterly subscriber growth, while analysts praised its financial performance.
The other two indices struggled to gain traction after the opening bell, but have since moved upward. The benchmark S&P 500 (SP500) was 0.92% higher to 3,934.79 points, while the blue-chip Dow (DJI) added 0.35% to 33,158.75 points.
Of the 11 S&P sectors, seven were trading in the green, led by Communication Services and Technology. Utilities, Health Care, Consumer Staples and Real Estate were the four losers.
“While Wall Street sags with the weight of recession fear and Federal Reserve jitters, Netflix’s huge beat on subscriber numbers has injected some much-needed optimism into the mix,” Hargreaves Landsdown’s Sophie Lund-Yates wrote.
Rates advanced. The 10-year Treasury yield (US10Y) rose 8 basis points to 3.48% and the 2-year yield (US2Y) rose 6 basis points to 4.18%.
Philadelphia Fed President Patrick Harker on Friday said he expects 25 basis-point rate hikes to be appropriate going forward and anticipated that the central bank would need to raise rates a few more times this year.
Fed Governor Christopher Waller in a speech said that there has been ample evidence in recent data that the Fed’s action is dampening economic activity. Waller also favors raising rates by 25 basis points at the next meeting.
Harker and Waller round out the final comments from Fed members before the February monetary policy committee meeting.
Yesterday, “Federal Reserve Vice-Chair Brainard (a respected economist) implied a slowing of policy rate tightening, but that US rates would stay high for some time,” UBS’ Paul Donovan said. “Similar language about the persistence of high rates is to be expected – as the Fed’s June policy errors trashed forward guidance, markets discount Fed comments.”
“Fiercer language is required to generate a moderate market reaction. As profit-led inflation falls, potentially rapidly, the Fed’s language will have to adjust.”
On the economic front, December existing home sales fell less than expected, coming in at -1.5% M/M to 4.02M compared to the expected 3.96M figure.
Other than Netflix, market participants digested quarterly results from companies such as paints and specialty materials provider PPG (PPG), which rose after an earnings beat, and SVB Financial (SIVB), which was higher despite disappointing results. SVB, Netflix and PPG were the top three percentage gainers on the S&P 500 (SP500).
Alphabet (GOOG) (GOOGL) gained after reportedly announcing plans to cut around 12,000 jobs.
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Image and article originally from seekingalpha.com. Read the original article here.