Wall street gains on robust november. hiring data
Wall Street indexes gained on Friday as US employers added more jobs than expected in November, cementing the case for an interest rate hike next week and adding to optimism about the economy heading into 2018. Nonfarm payrolls rose by 228,000 jobs last month amid broad gains in hiring as the distortions from the recent hurricanes faded, Labor Department data showed.
At 12:25 p.m. ET (1725 GMT), the Dow Jones Industrial Average was up 92.82 points, or 0.38 percent, at 24,304.3 and the S&P 500 was up 12.91 points, or 0.49 percent, at 2,649.89. The Nasdaq Composite was up 43.70 points, or 0.64 percent, at 6,856.54.
Microsoft rose 1.5 percent, AbbVie 2.3 percent and UnitedHealth 1.6 percent, the biggest boosts to the S&P 500. Shares of American Outdoor Brands slumped 11.25 percent after the Smith & Wesson fire arms maker provided disappointing earnings forecast.
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KSE-100 ups 295 points, finishes over 39,000
In another dramatic turn, stocks recovered from the previous session’s massacre and powered past the 39,000-point barrier to finish the last trading day of the week on a positive note. The KSE-100 Index shot up 550 points as news of the Pakistani rupee declining 4 percent in intra-day movement led the index forward.
Despite thin volumes, the positive run was a welcome respite from the three-day losing streak. Later, the index declined briefly but closed in the green. At the end of trading on Friday, the benchmark KSE 100-share Index registered an increase of 295.34 points or 0.76 percent to settle at 39,080. Overall, trading volumes fell to 149 million shares compared with Thursday’s tally of 163 million. Shares of 364 companies were traded.
At the end of the day, 160 stocks closed higher, 185 declined while 19 remained unchanged. The value of shares traded during the day was Rs7.3 billion. WorldCall Telecom was the volume leader with 16.5 million shares, gaining Rs0.13 to close at Rs3.13.
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European shares rally after brexit, banking rules deals
European stocks rallied to a week’s high on Friday as Britain and the European Union announced a breakthrough in Brexit negotiations and new global banking regulations appeared kinder to European banks than had been expected.
Financials lifted the pan-European Stoxx 600 0.8 percent. The euro zone banking index rose 2.3 percent, its best gains in five months. Among the top gainers were ABN Amro, up 5.3 percent; Danske Bank, up 4.6 percent, Unicredit up 4.1 percent and Credit Agricole rising 3.9 percent. Germany’s DAX hit a month’s high in intraday trading before closing up 0.8 percent. The financials-heavy Italian index surged 1.4 percent higher, its best day in six weeks. The FTSE 100 outperformed European shares as the pound, counter-intuitively; fell with investors cashing in their gains on the currency.
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Tokyo shares up on weaker yen, strong gdp
Tokyo stocks rose on Friday as the dollar held gains against the yen while a large upwards revision to Japan’s latest growth figures also provided a boost.
The benchmark Nikkei 225 index rose 1.39 percent, or 313.05 points, to close at 22,811.08. Over the week, the index edged down 0.03 percent. The broader Topix index was up 0.98 percent, or 17.48 points, at 1,803.73, with a weekly gain of 0.40 percent. Ten minutes before the opening bell, official data showed that Japan’s third-quarter gross domestic product (GDP) grew 0.6 percent from the previous quarter, expanding twice as fast as previously estimated.
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Sri Lanka shares lower
Sri Lanka stocks were lower after the close on Friday, as losses in the Footwear & Textile, Information Technology and Investment Trust sectors led shares lower.
At the close in Colombo, the CSE All-Share declined 0.12 percent to hit a new 1-month low. The best performers of the session on the CSE All-Share were People’s Merchant Finance PLC, which rose 18.70 percent or 2.30 points to trade at 14.60 at the close. Meanwhile, Hikkaduwa Beach Resort Ltd added 16.81percent or 1.90 points to end at 13.20 and Mercantile Shipping Company PLC was up 15.38 percent or 8.00 points to 60.00 in late trade. The worst performers of the session were Good Hope PLC, which fell 23.87 percent or 370.00 points to trade at 1180.00 at the close.
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Profit-taking lifts Mexican stocks
Mexican stocks rose on Friday, as investors snapped up relatively cheap assets following two consecutive sessions of the bourse’s leading index trading at lows not seen since February.
Mexico’s S&P/BMV IPC ended Friday’s session up 1.23 percent at 47,566.54 points. The peso strengthened about 0.20 percent, after US job growth posted solid gains in November but wages rose less than expected. US nonfarm payrolls rose by 228,000 jobs last month amid broad gains in hiring as the distortions from the recent hurricanes faded. Still, average hourly earnings rose 0.2 percent, less than the 0.3 percent consensus estimate.
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TSX notches two week high
Canada’s main stock index rose to a two-week high on Friday, led by financial and industrial shares after investor sentiment got a boost from solid US jobs data, while energy and mining stocks climbed on higher commodity prices.
The Toronto Stock Exchange’s S&P/TSX composite index unofficially closed up 80.39 points, or 0.5 percent, at 16,096.07. Nine of the index’s 10 main groups ended higher.
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Nigeria shares end 7-day winning streak
Nigerian stocks fell 0.7 percent on Friday to end a seven day winning streak as investors sold consumer goods and banking shares that were overbought, traders said. The main index gained six percent over the seven day rally to hit a new three-year high, lifting stocks up 47 percent so far this year.