U.S. stocks rose further into record territory on Friday, as investors were buoyed by strong data from the American job market, offsetting concerns about the persistent tensions in the Persian Gulf.
The S&P 500, the benchmark stock index in the United States, closed on Friday up a little over 0.8 percent, enough for the index to record its sixth straight week of gains, a run last clocked in October 2024 in the run up to the presidential election.
The rise on Friday came as fresh data showed U.S. employers had added 115,000 jobs last month and the unemployment rate remained at 4.3 percent, tempering concerns about immediate weakness in the labor market and helping the stock market to shrug off intensifying geopolitical tensions.
President Trump insisted on Thursday that a cease-fire with Iran remained intact even after the United States said it had struck Iranian military sites in retaliation for Iran firing on U.S. warships in the Strait of Hormuz. On Friday, Iran’s foreign minister accused the United States of “a reckless military adventure” and of undermining diplomatic efforts to end the war.
“What was remarkable about yesterday’s and today’s action in the markets is how unconcerned traders are about the renewal of kinetic attacks taking place in the U.S.-Iran conflict,” Thierry Wizman, a markets strategist at Macquarie Group, said on Friday.
With uncertainty swirling around the state of the cease-fire agreement, investors have been instead focused on the strong earnings season for public companies.
With roughly 90 percent of the companies in the S&P 500 having reported financial results for the first three months of the year, the average growth in earnings from last year is close to 30 percent, according to data from FactSet. That’s roughly double what analysts were expecting before earnings season began.
In the tech world, the behemoth companies at the forefront of artificial intelligence continue to surpass forecasts. Four of the top five contributors to year-over-year earnings growth in the S&P 500 have come from the Magnificent 7 cohort of tech companies: Alphabet, Nvidia, Amazon and Meta, according to FactSet. Alphabet reported earnings per share that were nearly double the amount analysts had forecast.
Elsewhere, stocks fell on Friday. In Europe, the Stoxx 600, a broad index that tracks the region’s largest companies, fell 0.6 percent. Stocks in Asia, where countries import vast quantities of oil and gas, mostly fell. Hong Kong’s Hang Seng Index fell about 1 percent, while markets in Japan, Taiwan and mainland China were all lower.
The intensifying tensions in the Persian Gulf on Friday help push up oil prices higher. The price of Brent crude, the global benchmark for oil, settled a little over 1 percent higher at $101.29 a barrel. West Texas Intermediate crude, the U.S. benchmark, rose less than one percent to $95.42 a barrel.
Gas prices don’t move in lock step with crude, usually trailing increases or drops by a few days.
Gas prices dipped on Friday, falling to a national average of $4.55 a gallon, according to the AAA motor club. Gas cost for drivers has increased by 53 percent since the war began. The average price of a gallon has reached $5 or more in seven states.
The average price of diesel fell by a penny to $5.66 on Friday, up 51 percent since the start of the war.
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