U.S. Stocks Seeing Further Upside In Mid-Day Trading

Stocks have shown a strong move to the upside over the course of the trading day on Friday, extending the advance seen in the previous session. With the continued upward move, the tech-heavy Nasdaq has reached its best intraday level in over two months.

The major averages have seen further upside in recent trading, reaching new highs for the session. The Dow is up 374.74 points or 1.6 percent at 24,250.63, the Nasdaq is up 134.05 points or 1.5 percent at 9,113.71 and the S&P 500 is up 40.69 points or 1.4 percent at 2,921.88.

The continued strength on Wall Street comes even though the Labor Department released a report showing a record nosedive in U.S. employment in the month of April.

The report said non-farm employment plummeted by 20.5 million jobs in April after tumbling by a revised 870,000 jobs in March.

The steep drop in employment was not as bad as feared, however, as economists had expected employment to plunge by 22.0 million jobs compared to the loss of 701,000 jobs originally reported for the previous month.

Traders seem to believe the dismal jobs picture was already priced into the markets during the sell-off seen in late February and March.

Many are now looking ahead to an anticipated economic rebound as states begin to reopen following their coronavirus-induced lockdowns.

The major averages have already climbed well off their March lows, with the tech-heavy Nasdaq turning slightly positive for the year on Thursday.

However, comments from several economists suggest the markets may be overly optimistic about the pace of the economic rebound.

Economists at Oxford Economics said they anticipate "the severe income loss, elevated precautionary savings and lingering virus fear will curtail consumer demand well past the lockdowns."

"Social distancing, consumer angst, travel restrictions and the legacy of up to 40 million jobs lost mean there is zero prospect of a V-shaped recovery," added ING Chief International Economist James Knightley.

Sector News

Tobacco stocks have shown a substantial move to the upside on the day, driving the NYSE Arca Tobacco Index up by 4.4 percent.

Significant strength is also visible among networking stocks, as reflected by the 3.2 percent spike by the NYSE Arca Networking Index.

Steel stocks also continue to see considerable strength in mid-day trading, with the NYSE Arca Steel Index jumping by 3 percent.

Energy, transportation and computer hardware stocks have also moved notably higher on the day, reflecting broad based buying interest.

Other Markets

In overseas trading, stock markets across the Asia-Pacific region moved mostly higher during trading on Friday. Japan's Nikkei 225 Index spiked by 2.6 percent, while China's Shanghai Composite Index climbed by 0.8 percent.

The major European markets also showed strong moves to the upside on the day. While the French CAC 40 Index jumped by 1.1 percent, the German DAX Index and the U.K.'s FTSE 100 Index both surged up by 1.4 percent.

In the bond market, treasuries have shown a lack of direction over the course of the session and are currently seeing modest weakness. As a result, the yield on the benchmark ten-year note, which moves opposite of its price, is up by 2.7 basis points at 0.658 percent.