Up-and-Down Week Ends in Fitting Fashion

The accurate description of Wall Street on Friday: mixed. The Dow jumped 129 points, or 0.3%, to 33,826; the S&P 500 fell 11 points, or 0.2%, to 4,079; and the Nasdaq fell 68 points, or 0.5%, to 11,787. That marks back-to-back weekly losses for the benchmark S&P. Stocks have hit turbulence in February after shooting higher in January with hopes that cooling inflation could get the Federal Reserve to take it easier on interest rates and that the economy could avoid a severe recession, per the AP. Reports recently have shown more strength than expected in everything from the job market to retail sales to inflation itself, raising worries about tough action still to come from the Fed.

Big technology and other high-growth companies have been taking the brunt of worries about the Fed because they're seen as some of the most vulnerable to higher rates. Their stocks soared in earlier years in part because of record-low rates. Microsoft fell 1.8%, Amazon dropped 1.3%, and Nvidia lost 2.7% for some of the heaviest weights on the S&P 500. Energy stocks also tumbled as the price of oil weakened. Exxon Mobil fell 3.5%. On the winning side was Deere, which gained 7.2% after reporting stronger profit for its latest quarter than analysts expected.

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