Shares on Wall Street ended a volatile week in the red on Fri. The major US equity indexes each lost more than 1% last week, on fears that Russia might invade Ukraine. The headlines from the Western press over the weekend have been alarmist. “Russian commanders reportedly given orders to invade Ukraine” blares the NY Post, citing an unnamed “US official”.
On Fri, the Dow Jones Industrial Average lost 232.85 pts, or 0.68%, to close at 34,079.18. S&P 500 index fell 0.72%. The tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite retreated 1.23%. The small cap Russell 2000 dropped 0.93%.
US financial markets will be closed on Mon (today) for Presidents Day. However, US equity index futures are trading. Dow and S&P 500 index futures are little changed in early trade.
DraftKings (DKNG US, -21.62%) shares plunged last Fri after adding fewer new customers than expected.
Roku (ROKU US, -22.3%) shares dropped after the video-streaming company reported a revenue miss.
The yield on the 10-year Treasury note slipped 3.29 basis points (bps) to 1.9286%.
The most actively traded US gold futures (Apr) contracts settled down $2.20, or 0.1%, at US$1,899.80/oz. March silver, which is the most actively traded silver futures, rose 11.7 cents, or 0.5%, to end at US$23.992/oz.
The ICE dollar index (DXY), which measures the strength of the greenback against a basket of currencies, rose 0.25% to 96.043.
The front-month Brent futures closed up 0.57 cents at US$93.54/bbl while the front-month WTI futures closed down 69 cents at US$91.07/bbl respectively. European equity markets finished lower last Fri.
The UK FTSE lost 0.32%, France's CAC 40 fell 0.25%, while the German DAX retreated 1.47%.