Wall Street Today: DJIA, S&P 500, Nasdaq Comp Fall as Oil Prices Soar and MU, SNDK, INTC, NVDA Sink

The S&P 500, Dow-30 and Nasdaq Composite all fell Friday as Micron, Amazon, Caterpillar and other big caps sank after oil prices soared on the escalating U.S.-Iran conflict, while the latest numbers showed America unexpectedly shedding jobs.

The $Nasdaq Composite Index (.IXIC.US)$ lost 361.31 points (1.6%) to a 22,387.68 close, while the $S&P 500 Index (.SPX.US)$ gave up 90.69 ticks (1.3%) to 6,740.02 and the $Dow Jones Industrial Average (.DJI.US)$ shed 453.19 points (1%) to 47,501.55.

Macro

The three indexes sank as $Crude Oil Futures (MAY6) (CLmain.US)$ rose as much as 14.3% to a $92.61-per-barrel session high in New York Mercantile Exchange trading – their firmest level since September 2023.

Energy prices continued to soar on fears that Iran's military will stop oil tankers from using the Strait of Hormuz, a narrow waterway off of its coast where 20% of global petroleum output travels.

Tensions rose after American President Donald Trump announced on social media Friday that he'll only accept unconditional surrender in the U.S.-Israel-Iran conflict, which began on Saturday.

Meanwhile, Qatari Energy Minister Saad al-Kaabi told The Financial Times that oil could hit $150 a barrel if the conflict drags on.

Market watchers fear that higher oil prices will spark major inflation and sink the world's industrial economies.

Adding to Friday's market headaches, the U.S. Labor Department reported before the bell that the American economy lost 92,000 non-farm jobs in February vs. the 50,000 increase that economists had forecast. That could point to a slowing U.S. economy.

All of the jitters helped send several key Big Techs down Friday, including $SanDisk (SNDK.US)$ (6.8% lower), $Micron Technology (MU.US)$ (off 6.7%), $Intel (INTC.US)$(5.5% weaker), $Taiwan Semiconductor (TSM.US)$ (4.2% lower), $Advanced Micro Devices (AMD.US)$ (down 3.5%), $NVIDIA (NVDA.US)$ (3% softer), $Meta Platforms (META.US)$ (off 2.6%) and $Amazon (AMZN.US)$ (which lost 2.4%).

Select non-tech Dow-30 components also fell, including $Caterpillar (CAT.US)$ (off 3.6%) and $American Express (AXP.US)$ (2% lower).

Elsewhere in markets, Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies fell sharply in a risk-off move.

$Bitcoin (BTC.CC)$ lost 4.3% to $68,151.17 as of about 4:15 p.m. New York time, while $Ethereum (ETH.CC)$ gave up 5.2% to $1,980.76, $Solana (SOL.CC)$shed 4.8% to $84.97 and $Ripple (XRP.CC)$eased 4.1% to $1.36.

Moo-vers

Wall Street's jitters sent all of the "Magnificent Seven" stocks lower Friday.

$NVIDIA (NVDA.US)$, $Amazon (AMZN.US)$ and $Meta Platforms (META.US)$ led the way downward with their previously noted declines of 3%, 2.6% and 2.4%, respectively. $Tesla (TSLA.US)$(down 2.2%) followed closely behind, while $Apple (AAPL.US)$lost 1.1%, $Alphabet-A (GOOGL.US)$ shed 0.8% and $Microsoft (MSFT.US)$ finished 0.4% lower.

Elsewhere on Wall Street, Friday's other significant percentage decliners included:

$Lumentum (LITE.US)$ (down 14.2%) and $Coherent (COHR.US)$ (7.2% weaker). The two fiberoptic-networking firms fell sharply for a second session after CEO Hock Tan of $Broadcom (AVGO.US)$ said earlier this week that his firm favors copper cables for its systems over fiberoptic ones. The two stocks have fallen for four sessions, completely giving back big gains they saw Monday on news that NVDA had taken stakes in both of them. LITE and COHR also lost ground despite speculation that S&P Dow Jones Indices could soon add one or both to the S&P 500.

-- $Corning (GLW.US)$, down 8.5%. The glass-products firm sank in sympathy with LITE and COHR on Hock Tan's remarks about preferring copper cables to fiberoptic ones.

-- Select cryptocurrency-related stocks, which fell on cryptos' Friday declines. Losers included $Applied Digital (APLD.US)$ (10.5% weaker), $IREN Ltd (IREN.US)$ (off 8.5%), $Bitmine Immersion Technologies (BMNR.US)$ (which lost 7.2%), $Robinhood (HOOD.US)$ (4.3% lower), $Strategy (MSTR.US)$ (which shed 4.5%), $Coinbase (COIN.US)$ (4.1% lower) and $Circle (CRCL.US)$ (down 3.6%).

Conversely, Friday's noteworthy percentage gainers included:

-- $Marvell Technology (MRVL.US)$, up 18.4%. The semiconductor-solutions firm rose on well-received quarterly results.

-- Certain oil and defense stocks, which rose on the continuing U.S.-Iran conflict. Defense-related gainers included $Palantir (PLTR.US)$ (up 2.9%) and $Red Cat Holdings (RCAT.US)$ (which added 1.9%). Large-cap oil stocks to rise included $Occidental Petroleum (OXY.US)$ (1.8% better) and $Exxon Mobil (XOM.US)$ (0.3% higher). Small- and micro-cap energy stocks did even better, with $Trio Petroleum (TPET.US)$ adding 21.4% and $Battalion Oil (BATL.US)$ gaining 17.7%.

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