The euro rose, the flow of business and economic news was positive and global markets were mixed, weak in Asia, warmer in Europe and solid on Friday in the US.
Even with Friday’s rise, the S&P ended a seven week winning streak, while in Australia the ASX200 ended nine weeks of gains.
But the Dow managed its eighth consecutive weekly gain, its longest streak since the March through April run in 2010, in which the index hit a high that stood for six months.
The Dow and S&P 500 rose on Friday after General Electric Co’s 31% jump in 4th quarter earnings added an extra positive tone to market sentiment.
The Nasdaq was pulled lower by fears over the senior management changes at Google earlier in the week and investor profit taking in the tech sector.
Shares of General Electric, a bellwether for the economy, ended up 7.%, hitting their highest intraday level since November 2008.
The stock, the top positive in the Dow, also scored its biggest daily percentage jump since March 2009.
The Dow Jones industrial rose 49.04 points, or 0.41%, to end at 11,871.84. The Standard & Poor’s 500 Index added 3.09 points, or 0.24%, to 1,283.35, but the Nasdaq Composite Index lost 14.75 points, or 0.5%, to close at 2,689.54.
For the week, the Dow rose 0.7%, the S&P lost 0.8% and the Nasdaq dropped 2.4% as investors sell and exit the previously strong tech sector.
The S&P 500 is up 8.7% since the start of December, but the index lost more than 1% on Thursday and Friday as more market commentators, chartists, etc warn the market is vulnerable to a sell off at current levels.
Investors got a reminder of the still weak state of the banking sector last week. Poor results from the likes of Goldman Sachs and Bank of America, not to mention Citigroup outweighed the strong performance the week before from JP Morgan.
And on Friday US banking regulators closed four banks, taking to seven the number shut so far this year and 329 since the start of 2008.
In Europe the Stoxx 600 dropped 0.9% last week, after rising for two straight weeks. Even so, the gauge is still up 2% this year.
London’s FTSE 100 gained 28.34, or 0.5%, to 5,896.25 at the close, trimming this week’s fall to 1.8%.
The MSCI Asia Pacific Index lost 1.7% last week, halting five straight weeks of advance.
Hong Kong’s Hang Seng Index dropped 1.7%. China’s Shanghai Composite Index slipped 2.7%.
Markets in Indonesia and Philippines also slid, driving their benchmark indexes more than 10% below recent highs, on concern inflation will lead to higher borrowing costs and pare corporate earnings.
Japan’s Nikkei fell 2.1% (down 1.6% on Friday) while Australia’s S&P/ASX 200 Index slid 1%.
That was the biggest drop for Australia in nine weeks.
The benchmark ASX200 Index ended the day down 28 points lower, or 0.6%, to 4755.7 points, while the All Ordinaries Index lost up 31.1 points, or 0.6%, to 4860.9.
China’s Shanghai Composite Index rose 1.4% on Friday as investors speculated recent declines on tightening concerns were overdone. The gauge slumped 2.9% yesterday and fell 3% last Monday.
The loss so far for 2010 is 4.6%.
News that China’s economy grew 9.8% in the fourth quarter, while inflation barely slowed, raised concerns that the government will tighten monetary policy to cool the economy.
