The US markets ended higher on Friday as traders felt the banking concerns have been overdone amid optimism the Federal Reserve is nearing the end of its tightening cycle. However, U.S.-listed shares of Deutsche Bank (DB) moved sharply lower in early trading amid a spike by the German lender's credit default swaps. Credit Suisse (CS) and UBS Group (UBS) also came under pressure after a report said they are among banks under scrutiny in a Justice Department probe into whether financial professionals helped Russian oligarchs evade sanctions. On the sectoral front, Interest rate-sensitive utilities and commercial real estate stocks moved sharply higher over the course of the session, driving the Dow Jones Utility Average and the Dow Jones U.S. Real Estate Index up by 3.2 percent and 2.6 percent, respectively.
A sharp increase by the price of natural gas also contributed to significant strength among natural gas stocks, with the NYSE Arca Natural Gas Index jumping by 1.9 percent. Gold stocks also moved notably higher despite a pullback by the price of the precious metal, resulting in a 2.3 percent gain by the NYSE Arca Gold Bugs Index. On the economic data front, the Commerce Department released a report showing a continued slump in orders for transportation equipment led to an unexpected decrease in new orders for U.S. manufactured durable goods in the month of February. The Commerce Department said durable goods orders slid by 1.0 percent in February after plummeting by a revised 5.0 percent in January. Street had expected durable goods orders to increase by 0.6 percent compared to the 4.5 percent plunge that had been reported for the previous month.
Dow Jones Industrial Average gained 132.28 points or 0.41 percent to 32,237.53, Nasdaq rose 36.56 points or 0.31 percent to 11,823.96 and S&P 500 was up by 22.27 points 0.56 percent to 3,970.99.
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