© Reuters
NEW YORK (dpa-AFX) – At the end of a good week on the stock market, prices on the stock markets rose again. Relief prevailed among investors on Friday in view of the new inflation data. The PCE price index, which is preferred by the US Federal Reserve, did not rise quite as much in February as analysts had expected. As a result, the industrial rose by 0.70 percent to 33,087.80 points and for the first time in three weeks passed the 33,000 point mark.
The market breadth gained 0.77 percent to 4082.03 points. The tech-heavy Nasdaq 100 was up 0.99 percent to 13,091.61 points.
On a weekly basis, the leading index Dow is showing an increase of a good two and a half percent. “If we end the week in the green that’s a big deal considering how disastrous the rest of the month was,” wrote Craig Erlam, senior market analyst at trading house Oanda, referring to the recent troubles in the banking sector. These had led to a sell-off in the industry, which had a negative impact on the overall market. The Dow has been slightly down since the beginning of the year.
Looking at the individual values, two lightweights attracted interest on Friday. Virgin Orbit shares fell by more than a third. After a failed satellite launch earlier this year, British billionaire Richard Branson’s space company is laying off most of its employees. The stock fell below $1 in mid-March, making it a penny stock. The company is now worth just over $70 million on the stock exchange. At the beginning of 2022, the market value was still 3.8 billion dollars.
Shares of Nikola (NASDAQ:) fell more than 12 percent. The developer of battery and hydrogen-powered commercial vehicles has increased capital by $100 million. The new shares were placed at $1.12 per share, well below the previous day’s closing price of $1.40, disappointing the market.
The biggest losers on the stock exchange were Micron (NASDAQ:) Technology, which fell 2.8 percent. In the dispute with the USA over semiconductors, China now wants to take a close look at the company’s products in terms of cyber security.
The shares of Intel (NASDAQ:) are still in forward gear. They gained two percent at the top of the Dow, reaching their highest level since the end of August 2022. A price rally of over 30 percent is emerging for the month of March.
