The NASDAQ Composite rebounded on Friday as some investors bought the dip in chip stocks following a punishing selloff that sent the index into correction territory.
The Dow Jones Industrial index ended the day down 236.85 points to 51,286.21.
The S&P 500 index recovered 23.19 points to 7,376.92.
The tech-heavy NASDAQ staged a comeback climbing 264.43 points, or 1.1%, to 24,579.43.
All three major averages were poised for losses on the week, even after Wednesday’s big rally in the wake of the election. The NASDAQ is off
by 3% and the S&P 500 by 2%. The 30-stock Dow was the outperformer, lower by less than 1% week to date.
During Friday’s session, shares of Micron Technology were up 5% following a 17% decline on Thursday. Nvidia was 3% higher after a 9% rout the day before and moved back into positive territory for the year.
The “Magnificent Seven” stocks shed $1 trillion in total market capitalization on Thursday alone. Along with Nvidia, Tesla, Meta Platforms and Alphabet saw gains Friday.
Worries of a potential slowdown in data center construction following big Democratic wins in the House and Senate and key state governorships hit U.S. markets hard on Thursday.
Top Democrats have called for the curbing of the data center buildout since the party’s big election win. Governor-Elect Gina Hinojosa of Texas, a key data center hub in the country, said in a CNN interview Thursday evening, “We will have laws to protect Texans, and we need to stop what we are doing with data centers until we have those protections.”
Investors reacted to the latest nonfarm payrolls report, which came in much better than expected at an increase of 165,000 in October.
That was well above the 59,000 that economists polled by Dow Jones had anticipated. The unemployment rate also moved down to 4.1%. Economists had expected it to hold steady at 4.2%.
Prices for the 10-year Treasury hesitated, raising yields to 4.86% from Wednesday’s 4.84%. Treasury prices and yields move in opposite directions.
Oil prices squeaked ahead 15 cents to $90.67 U.S. a barrel.
Gold prices flopped $39.40 to $4,074.10 U.S. an ounce.
