The stock exchanges in New York opened Friday with small gains on the last trading day of the week. Investors on Wall Street are mainly focused on the crucial US government jobs report. It showed that employment in the United States increased more than expected in June, with the labour market in the world’s largest economy showing further recovery from the corona crisis.
Employment in the US increased by 850,000 new jobs in June. That is stronger than a month earlier and also better than average economists had expected due to the recovery from the crisis and the relaxation of the corona measures. In addition to inflation, job growth plays an essential role in the interest rate policy of the Federal Reserve, the umbrella organization of US central banks.
The leading Dow-Jones index was up 0.1 percent shortly after opening at 34,671 points. The broad S&P 500 gained 0.2 percent to 4328 points, and the technology gauge Nasdaq rose 0.4 percent to 14,583 points.
Among the companies, space company Virgin Galactic is a notable outlier with a plus of 18 percent. British billionaire and businessman Richard Branson will go into space on Sunday, July 11, with a spacecraft from his company Virgin Galactic. That’s nine days ahead of his rival Jeff Bezos. The Amazon CEO who owns the space company Blue Origin has planned his first space journey for July 20.
Tesla rose 1.2 percent. The company produced and delivered more than 200,000 electric cars last quarter. With this, Tesla has further increased production compared to the first three months of this year. Analysts had expected slightly more.
The Chinese taxi app Didi Global, listed in New York since Wednesday, fell almost 9 percent. China has launched an investigation into cybersecurity at the company, and Didi cannot take on new customers while that investigation continues.
A barrel of US oil was 0.4 percent cheaper at $ 74.93. Brent oil cost 0.2 percent less at $ 75.69. The euro was worth $1.1842, compared to $1.1850 a day earlier.
