[New York Stock Market] Ends Mixed; 'SOXL' Surges 8% as Semiconductor Stocks Rally

[Financial News]  

The New York stock market closed mixed on the 18th local time. The Dow Jones Industrial Average (DJIA) turned lower just one day after rebounding, while the technology-heavy Standard & Poor's 500 Index (S&P 500) and Nasdaq rose for a second consecutive session.
The Nasdaq-100, which comprises 100 large-cap technology stocks, led the gains by jumping nearly 0.7%.
Semiconductors also extended their gains. The semiconductor stock three-times leveraged exchange-traded fund (ETF) SOXL jumped another 7.8% after soaring nearly 10% the previous day.

The DJIA closed down 95.40 points, or 0.18%, from the previous session at 51,682.64. IBM, Walt Disney and Nike dragged the index lower.
By contrast, the S&P 500 finished up 12.74 points, or 0.17%, at 7,650.50, while the Nasdaq rose 104.25 points, or 0.40%, to close at 26,522.55.
The three major indexes also showed divergent weekly performances.
The DJIA and S&P 500 fell 1.7% and 0.1%, respectively, while the Nasdaq gained 0.7%.
The Nasdaq-100 climbed 191.19 points, or 0.67%, to 29,644.17.
ProShares UltraPro QQQ (TQQQ), a leveraged ETF that tracks three times the daily movements of the Nasdaq-100, gained $1.26, or 1.77%, to close at $72.64.
Wall Street's fear gauge, the Chicago Board Options Exchange (Cboe) Volatility Index (VIX), fell sharply for a second consecutive day. It dropped 0.61 points, or 3.96%, to 14.83.

Semiconductors continued their upward trend.
NVIDIA, the sector leader, rose $2.93, or 1.34%, to $222.27, while Micron Technology surged $38.30, or 3.92%, to close at $1,015.80.
SanDisk soared 177.43 points, or 10.99%, to $1,791.82, while SK hynix's American depositary receipt (ADR) rose $4.51, or 2.46%, to finish at $187.50.
The Philadelphia Semiconductor Index (SOX) jumped 322.19 points, or 2.78%, to 11,921.69, while the semiconductor leveraged ETF SOXL surged $8.95, or 7.79%, to $123.77.

Big tech stocks were mostly lower.
Apple fell $0.87, or 0.26%, to $336.13, while Microsoft declined $3.97, or 0.80%, to close at $493.78.
Tesla dropped $1.93, or 0.53%, to $364.27, while SpaceX fell $2.10, or 1.36%, to $152.71.
Alphabet, however, gained $2.21, or 0.64%, to $349.54, while Palantir Technologies rose $1.40, or 0.79%, to close at $177.64.

Nike and Netflix both declined.
Nike's shares fell after the company lost French soccer star Kylian Mbappé of Real Madrid. Mbappé signed a contract with Swiss footwear maker ON, whose management team includes tennis star Roger Federer.
As a result, Nike shares slid $0.85, or 2.34%, to $35.51.
Netflix plunged $3.52, or 4.67%, to $71.79. The decline was largely driven by Wells Fargo's downgrade of the stock to 'underweight (sell).'
Wells Fargo took a pessimistic view, saying Netflix viewership was falling and content releases were expected to slow in the second half of this year, making weaker margins from next year onward unavoidable.

[email protected] Song Kyung-jae Reporter