The Nasdaq’s longest winning streak in 17 years came to an end Friday on the heels of weaker than expected quarterly sales from Microsoft (NASDAQ: MSFT) and Amazon.com (NASDAQ: AMZN).
Perhaps the most surprising thing about the day’s stock market action is that the Nasdaq lost only 0.4% on a day that saw Amazon and Microsoft fall by 8% each, as traders continue to price in hopes of an economic recovery despite persistently high unemployment and sluggish conditions.
The Dow and S&P even managed small gains as the Nasaq’s 12-day winning streak came to an end.
Juniper (NASDAQ: JNPR) posted a slight gain on its earnings report, and RF Micro (NASDAQ: RFMD) soared 15% on an upbeat forecast.
But Ericsson (NASDAQ: ERIC), Broadcom (NASDAQ: BRCM) and Riverbed (NASDAQ: RVBD) fell sharply on their results.
Next week will see more earnings reports from the likes of Verizon (NYSE: VZ), Symantec (NASDAQ: SYMC) and Motorola (NYSE: MOT), but the most important report could be the government’s first read on second-quarter GDP on July 31.
Economists are looking for a decline of 1.5 percent for second-quarter GDP, a sharp improvement from readings of -5.5 and -6.3 percent in the previous two quarters. It would be the fourth straight quarter of negative GDP, the first time that’s happened in 62 years of quarterly Commerce Department data.
The Nasdaq lost 7 to 1965, the S&P 500 gained 3 to 979, and the Dow rose 24 to 9093. Volume fell to 4.46 billion shares on the NYSE, and 2.25 billion on the Nasdaq. Advancers led by a 22-14 margin on the NYSE, and 14-12 on the Nasdaq. Upside volume was 64% on the NYSE, and 47% on the Nasdaq. New highs-new lows were 85-64 on the NYSE, and 79-17 on the Nasdaq.