Wall Street lost its grip on new highs established during the previous trading session on Friday, as the major US indices and exchanges stumbled to close out the week on a particularly low note. The rather vicious sell-off took a moment to ramp up as investors initially seemed pleased with good numbers from the Labor Department’s non-farm payrolls report that left the current 6.7 percent unemployment rate unchanged. Growth stocks in the tech and biotech spaces were largely responsible for the undertow that pulled markets lower to close out the week’s trading, however, as the NASDAQ took the hardest hit of the day, off more than 2.5 percent by the bell.
Results for Friday, April 4
? Standard & Poor’s 500: -1.25 percent to 1,865.09
? Dow Jones Industrial Average: -0.96 percent to 16,412.71
? NASDAQ Exchange: -2.60 percent to 4,127.73
Our Top Stories
? Senior Editor and resident Bitcoin correspondent Jacob Harper finds it remarkable that the virtual currency has yet to either implode or explode.
? Senior Editor Joel Anderson looks at the weather conditions in Brazil that have sparked a reversal in coffee prices since the beginning of 2014.
? The Mining Report spoke recently with Rockstone Research analyst Stephen Bogner about the recent crisis in Ukraine and how the events of the past weeks might well be a sign that the momentum in high-stakes geopolitics is subtly shifting from West to East, and what investors can do about it.
? The Gold Report has the transcript of an interesting chat with fund-manager Rob Cohen about moving money from bullion over to equities.
? As tech shares more or less brought down the house on Friday, it is all the more timely that we’ve offered up this look at Mike Judge’s upcoming HBO satire series “Silicon Valley.”
? Mona Sukkarieh checks in from Beirut with a primer on what could turn out to be tremendous oil and gas prospects off the coast of Lebanon.
? Dennis Miller of Casey Research files this introspective piece on the financial benefits of a healthy diet.
? Now that David Letterman’s departure from the late show is official, we can begin speculating on who might fill his shoes.
Stocks
? Tech shares pulled US equities down into the red during Friay’s session, which made for a particularly rough transition for tech giant Google (GOOG) in the wake of the company’s stock split, with shares down by 4 percent just ahead of the bell. Other heavy hitters like Facebook (FB) , Micron Technology (MU) , and Microsoft (MSFT) were not far behind as investors precipitated towards the exits.
? Shipping stocks were a lonely bright spot during the day’s selling activity, with Genco Shipping and Trading (GNK) leading the way up on gains of over 25 percent.
? Oil & gas services and pure hydraulic fracturing play Emerge Energy Services (EMES) made big gains on the day after the frac-sand producer’s stock was upgraded to “outperform” by Robert W. Baird.
? The long-awaited debut of GrubHub ($GRUB) did not disappoint as shares added over 30 percent on their very first day of trading.
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