Wall Street closed higher on Friday, pushing stocks to their first weekly advance this year, ahead of Donald Trump’s return to the White House.
President-elect Trump’s inauguration is Monday, and his first days are expected to be filled with a flurry of executive orders.
“Reports suggest 100 or more,” wrote Morgan Stanley analysts in a report. Any signals of how Trump’s proposed tariffs would be implemented would be carefully watched, they said.
Morgan Stanley economists still think the Federal Reserve could lower interest rates at its March policy meeting after cooler inflation data earlier this week, but noted “sooner and higher-than-expected tariffs can take March off of the table.”
Bitcoin gained 4.95%, closing in on $105,000, in anticipation of a possible first day order by Trump. It was last at $104,949 on reports that Trump could release an executive order making crypto a national priority as soon as his new term begins. Crypto-related shares like Coinbase and Robinhood rose, too.”
The broad S&P 500 index closed up 1% at 5,996.71; the blue-chip Dow gained 0,77%, rising to 43,487.52; and the tech-heavy Nasdaq jumped 1.51% to 19,630.20.
Shares of social media giants Facebook and Instagram owner Meta and YouTube parent Alphabet advanced after the Supreme Court upheld a law that could ban TikTok if its Chinese parent company doesn’t sell it. Trump reportedly is considering an executive order to stop the ban. Meanwhile, Meta and Alphabet closed higher because they may be among the companies that could benefit from a TikTok ban, analysts said.
The benchmark 10-year Treasury yield firmed to 4.615%.
Sizing up markets heading into inauguration Monday
U.S. stocks notched their first weekly gain this year, with the S&P 500 and Dow logging their biggest weekly gains since November. The Nasdaq put in its best week since December.
“The U.S. macro backdrop at the moment, at least per December’s data, is one that points to the ‘best of all worlds’ – higher employment, falling core inflation (which excludes the volatile food and energy sectors), and a strong consumer,” said Michael Brown, senior research strategist at Pepperstone, which offers trading services. “Not a bad inheritance for President-elect Trump to pick up on Monday.”
On Friday morning, December industrial production and capacity utilization both easily beat expectations. Industrial production, which measures factory output, rose 0.9% and capacity utilization, which measures how efficiently resources are used, improved to 77.6%.
On a technical basis, stocks also look bullish, said Larry Tentarelli, chief technical strategist for Blue Chip Daily Trend Report.
So-called sentiment indicators — bullish or bearish — at extreme levels are “fairly reliable contrarian indicators,” Tentarelli said, and bullish sentiment for stocks currently is at the lowest level since the November 2023 major S&P 500 lows in November 2023. This should bode well for stocks, he said.
“Investors tend to be most bullish at market highs and most bearish near market lows,” he said.
Corporate news
Corporate news continues to garner attention. Some of the day’s biggest movers were:
- Tesla shares added 3% on speculation Tesla founder Elon Musk will buy TikTok. Earlier reports suggested ByteDance was considering a TikTok sale to Musk, who owns X and is a Trump ally.
- J.B. Hunt’s shares dropped more than 7% after the transport company reported earnings below analysts’ forecasts.
- Intel stock jumped more than 9% amid takeover speculation.
- Schlumberger stock gained 6% after the oil giant beat fourth-quarter profit forecasts, benefiting from higher demand for its drilling equipment and technology in North America and international markets.
- Truist Financial shares rose 6% after the company said its fourth-quarter profit rose as it earned more in interest payments.
- Trump Media shares gave back early gains to end down 2.37% ahead of Trump’s inauguration.
- Novo Nordisk stock fell more than 5% after the drug maker’s weight-loss drug Wegovy and diabetes medicine Ozempic landed on Medicare’s list of the next 15 drugs to face price negotiations.
