INSUBCONTINENT EXCLUSIVE:
Stocks fell in regular trading Friday, as all major American indices fell in the wake of a broadly negative jobs report
With more than 700,000 jobs lost in the March data, unemployment in the United States rose from 3.5% to 4.4%.
The markets have been bracing
for widespread job losses due to the continued fallout from COVID-19, the disease caused by coronavirus that has prompted local, county and
state officials throughout the U.S
and Europe to issue stay-at-home orders
Those directives have forced bars, restaurants, gyms and other non-essentials businesses to close.
While the market had expected a wave of
job losses, stocks fell as those figures surpassed expectations
Selloffs were further spurred by this troubling recognition: Friday figures only account for unemployment-insurance claims individuals filed
in the first two weeks of March, before most of the COVID-related layoffs began.
This was unlike Thursday, when negative data led to market
gains.
Here are the day raw results:
Dow Jones Industrial Average: down 1.67%, or 357.99 points, to close at 21,055.45
S-P 500: fell 1.52%,
or 38.34 points, to close at 2,488.56
Nasdaq composite: declined 1.53%, or 114.23 points, to close at 7,373.08
Shares of SaaS and cloud
companies tracked by the Bessemer cloud index fell as well, while cryptocurrencies were roughly flat in the 24-hour period ending with the
close of equity trading.
There were standouts, however
Shares of Tesla held onto some of their after-hours gains recorded yesterday, closing the day up 5.62% to close at $408.01 as the company
continued to ride its positive report that it had delivered more vehicles than expected
Bill.com, a recent SaaS IPO, managed gains as well, closing the day up 2.71%
It was somewhat hard to find exceptions to the selloff; most companies lost ground in the face of worse-than-expected economic data.
Every
sector saw downward pressure Friday, with the exception of energy and consumer products, which saw a bit of a lift
Oil futures had one of its best days on record, after Russian President Vladimir Putin said global cuts of around 10 million barrels a day
are possible.
Airlines were also hit Friday after the U.S
Department of Transportation ordered the industry to provide refunds on any flights that companies had canceled
While airline stocks recovered, they all closed in negative territory
United Airlines fell 2.28% to close at $22.88, American Airlines declined 6.8% to $9.38 and Delta Airlines dropped 0.88% to $22.48.
The
pendulum will swing away from founder-friendly venture raises
