MarketView for March 23

Summary 

The major equity indexes were slightly higher with light volume on Friday, the result of rising energy and basic materials shares, as the S&P 500 index kept showing resilience even as it posted its second negative week so far this year. The S&P 500 found strong support at its 14-day moving average, near 1,386, from where it bounced back to post gains for the day. Nonetheless, it did fall 0.5 percent for the week.

However, in an indication of the rally's strength and consistency, that was the S&P's worst performance since the last week of December. In its only other down week in 2012, the index dipped 0.17 percent. Meanwhile, the market edged lower in early trading, but downward momentum faded despite widespread expectations for a correction after a rally that set the S&P 500 up for its best back-to-back quarters since 2009. The S&P 500 is still near its highest since May 2008.

For the week, the Dow Jones Industrial Average chalked up a loss of 1.2 percent as the S&P 500 posted a negative 0.5 percent, while the Nasdaq was up 0.4 percent. It was the Nasdaq's sixth-straight week of gains, following a dip of 0.06 percent early last month.

About 5.9 billion shares changed hands on the three major equity exchanges, the second-lowest volume for any day this year. The daily volume average so far in 2012 is 6.84 billion shares.

Domestic crude oil futures prices rose 1.4 percent to settle at $106.87 a barrel on estimates that Iranian oil exports fell significantly this month. As a result stocks such as Chevron gained ground with Chevron ending the day up 1 percent to close at $106.36.

A catalyst for Friday's rebound in basic resources stocks came from the world's top copper producer, Chile's Codelco, which reported a sharp rise in profits and an increase in production. Copper prices were up1 percent.

New U.S. single-family home sales fell 1.6 percent in February while prices jumped to their highest level in eight months, according to a government report on Friday that was the latest to paint a mixed picture of the housing market. KB Home fell 8.5 percent to end the day at $10.29 after the fifth-largest U.S. homebuilder posted a wider first-quarter loss and said orders for new homes declined.

Online games maker Zynga fell 2.6 percent to $13.40 after it said shareholders will sell about 43 million shares in a secondary offering.

Monster Worldwide is open to selling all or part of itself and expects to have data ready for potential buyers soon, its chief executive said in an interview. Monster's stock was up 7.7 percent closing at $10.22.

Jobless Rates Decline

The unemployment rates in almost all metropolitan areas fell in January when compared to a year earlier, and a majority were lower than the national rate, the Labor Department reported on Friday. Jobless rates decreased in 345 of the 372 areas, which typically include a city and its surrounding suburbs, and those in Decatur, Alabama, and Monroe, Michigan, dropped the most.

At the same time, 201 areas recorded January unemployment rates below the U.S. rate of 8.8 percent, not seasonally adjusted. Frequently, the Labor Department will adjust jobs numbers to account for seasonal factors such as holiday hiring or weather.

While the effects of the recession that began in 2007 were nearly uniform across the country, the recovery has been far more uneven, with areas where housing had fueled the local economies still hurting. The states of Nevada and California have the highest unemployment rates in the country, and their anemic job markets can be seen on the local level.

El Centro, an inland town in southern California, held the highest unemployment rate in the country in January, 26.4 percent, followed by Arizona's Yuma, where the rate was 24.5 percent. Meanwhile, 10 of the other 11 areas with jobless rates of at least 15 percent or more were in California. Of the 49 areas with a population of 1 million or more, Nevada's Las Vegas-Paradise region had the highest jobless rate, 13.1 percent.