US stocks open mixed at the end of a holiday-shortened week
NEW YORK — Stocks are off to a mixed start on Wall Street as traders return from the Christmas holidays. The S&P 500 edged up 0.1% Friday morning. The index maintains a modest gain for the week. The Dow Jones Industrial Average was little changed and the Nasdaq composite rose 0.2%, helped by gains in several big tech stocks like Nvidia. Crude oil fell, while gold and silver continued to rise. Trading should be light at the end of the holiday-shortened week. European markets were mostly closed, as were several Asian markets. The Japanese Nikkei rose 0.7%.
THIS IS A LATEST UPDATE. AP’s earlier story follows below.
BANGKOK — U.S. futures edged lower and Asian stocks were mixed Friday, with Tokyo’s Nikkei 225 leading the gains.
Gold and silver prices hit record highs, extending their sharp gains for the year as investors, including central banks, stocked up on the precious metals, seen as safe havens in times of uncertainty.
The price of gold gained 0.9% to $4,541.80 per troy ounce, while silver jumped 4.5% to $74.90 per ounce, at one point surpassing $75 per ounce.
Previous rises in gold prices partly reflected concerns over the weeks-long U.S. government shutdown. Expectations that the U.S. Federal Reserve would cut interest rates further in the new year, thereby weakening the dollar against other currencies, also fueled gold buying.
“Gold does what gold does when the world loses its anchor: it becomes the anchor,” Stephen Innes of SPI Asset Management said in a recent report. “For centuries, gold has been the only asset that doesn’t blink. When politics go wrong, when currencies crumble, when inflation eats up furniture, gold is the only piece of security that the world still considers definitive.”
In the stock market, Tokyo’s Nikkei 225 index rose 0.7 percent to 50,750.39 after the Cabinet approved a record defense budget plan topping 9 trillion yen ($58 billion) for the next fiscal year. Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi’s government aims to bolster Japan’s response capacity and coastal defenses with cruise missiles and unmanned arsenals at a time of heightened tensions with China.
Heavy industries and high-tech companies led the advance.
The dollar fell from 155.83 Japanese yen to 156.25 yen. The euro fell to $1.1777 from $1.1785.
Mainland Chinese markets rose, with the Shanghai Composite index gaining 0.1% to 3,963.68.
South Korea’s Kospi rose 0.5% to 4,129.68, while Taiwan’s Taiex jumped 0.7%.
Stocks fell in Thailand and India.
Elsewhere in the region, markets in Hong Kong, Australia, New Zealand and Indonesia were closed. Most European markets will remain closed on Friday, while Wall Street will reopen for a full day after the Christmas holiday. Volumes will likely remain light as most investors have liquidated their positions for the year.
In other trading Friday morning, U.S. crude oil gained 18 cents to $58.53 a barrel and Brent crude gained 15 cents to $61.95 a barrel.
Oil prices have fallen recently after reaching nearly $70 a barrel in June.
Bitcoin price rose 2.2% to $89,705.
