NEW YORK (AP) – Following a somewhat disappointing jobs report and U.S. missile strikes against Syria, stocks aren’t much changed Friday as investors buy gold and high-dividend stocks and sell banks and other assets. Defense contractors are making substantial gains and the price of oil is rising.
KEEPING SCORE: The Standard & Poor’s 500 held steady at 2,356 at noon Eastern time. The Dow Jones industrial average rose 4 points to 20,666. The Nasdaq composite fell 4 points, or 0.1 percent, to 5,874. The Russell 2000 index of small-company stocks fell a fraction to 1,364.
The New York Stock Exchange was about evenly split between stocks that were rising and stocks that were falling.
HIRING: The government said employers added 98,000 jobs in March, about half as many as analysts had predicted. Hiring dropped off somewhat after a few months of strong job growth that was linked to warm weather that boosted hiring in construction. The monthly job gains in January and February were revised a bit lower, which meant that hiring over the last three months continued at about the same pace as 2016. The unemployment rate fell to a 10-year low of 4.5 percent.
AIRSTRIKES: Overnight, the U.S. launched a missile attack on a Syrian air force base following a chemical weapons strike blamed on the government of President Bashar Assad earlier in the week. The move was condemned by Russia and Iran. The U.S. government started shifting its policy on Syria before the close of trading Wednesday, which pushed the VIX, known as Wall Street’s “fear gauge,” higher.