Thank goodness it is finally the weekend. We had a busy week filled with Federal Reserve news, a penny stocks frenzy and all sorts of big crypto moves. So as you prep for a few days off, what did the stock market do today? And what else do you need to know?
To start, stocks were mixed to end Friday trading. The S&P 500 shed 0.06%, while the Dow Jones Industrial Average shed 0.71%. The Nasdaq Composite gained despite some bad tech news, adding 0.76%.
So what did the stock market do today? Take a look at the top three stories.
What Did the Stock Market Do Today? Watch Tech.
Yesterday, one of the major stories on Wall Street was a new wave of the tech stocks selloff.
As investors flip-flopped on comments from Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell, risk-on sentiment shifted. Yields on the 10-year U.S. Treasury note were climbing, and it seemed as if Powell had not done enough to assuage inflation concerns.
Today, tech stocks were back in focus, but due to a series of specific reports. Tesla (NASDAQ:TSLA) tumbled during intraday trading, although it ultimately closed out Friday in the green. Driving the move was a report that China would restrict the use of Tesla vehicles by military members and employees of state-owned companies. As the electric vehicle giant makes bigger moves in China, that news shook shares. It also gave Nio (NYSE:NIO), a Chinese player in the red-hot market, a boost. To some investors, it seems that the threat of U.S.-China relations on certain tech firms is just too hard to disentangle.
Payments giant Visa (NYSE:V) also found itself in the hot seat, as that company continues to lean into the emerging fintech theme. Driving the drop in Visa stock today is news that the U.S. Department of Justice is launching a probe into its business. In question is whether or not it employs anticompetitive practices in its debit-card business. This is not the first time Visa has faced scrutiny in recent months. As you may recall, Visa faced a suit in November for its attempted acquisition of Plaid. Now, the company once again must strike a balance between its appealing sector leadership and appeasing regulators.
Lastly, we learned that antitrust regulators in the United Kingdom are prepping to investigate Facebook (NASDAQ:FB). Despite that news, FB stock closed higher by 4% on Friday.
How to Profit From the Reddit Penny Stocks Boom
InvestorPlace Markets Analyst Tom Yeung illustrates an interesting example. Investors who put $500 into blockchain startup HUMBL (OTCMKTS:TSNPD) in October 2020 would now have $3.4 million. And while those are stunning gains, they are not unique in the realm of Reddit penny stocks.
As Yeung writes, there was a day when Wall Street fully turned its pack on penny stocks. Now, savvy Reddit investors can see quintuple-digit returns and play cyber sleuths to get in ahead of major company announcements. If these retail investors time it right, one good pick can more than make up for all of their other losses on speculative companies.
Simply put, Yeung argues that investors would be wrong to ignore this penny stocks frenzy. Instead, he encourages investors to think like a Reddit sleuth. You can read more of his advice here.
Winners, Losers, Honorable Mentions
Winners: Cardano (CCC:ADA) shone this week after Coinbase Pro accounts gained trading access to the emerging cryptocurrency. Not only is this a win in terms of access and visibility, but it comes at a critical time in the crypto conversation. As focus turns to the energy consumption of Bitcoin (CCC:BTC), some have proposed ADA as an eco-friendly option. Other cryptocurrencies faced similar excitement on news of new trusts from Grayscale Investments.
Losers: Teladoc (NYSE:TDOC) and its telemedicine peers faced a big blow from Amazon (NASDAQ:AMZN), as the giant plans its move into the mainstream telehealth space. Lordstown Motors (NASDAQ:RIDE) and Nikola (NASDAQ:NKLA) also faced painful blows in the EV space.
Honorable Mentions: This was an odd trading week, worthy of odd honorable mentions. So-called NFT stocks stand out for their truly speculative nature. Takung Art (NYSEMKT:TKAT) gained as much as 277% in one trading day as cyber sleuths searched for NFT ties. Elsewhere on Wall Street, long-forgotten Helios and Matheson Analytics (OTCMKTS:HMNY) absolutely skyrocketed on an alleged return of MoviePass. Internet users believe it was all a hoax, but that did not stop HMNY shares from soaring.
On the date of publication, Sarah Smith did not have (either directly or indirectly) any positions in the securities mentioned in this article.
Sarah Smith is a Web Content Producer with InvestorPlace.com.
