U.S. stocks traded lower Friday afternoon as a positive jobs report was overshadowed by more unrest in the Euro Zone.
Experts believed the report would show about 230,000 new jobs created in January, so the actual number of 257,000 new jobs was a pleasant surprise for investors. Wall Street analysts admitted they’ve been looking for non-oil-related news to move markets.
Unemployment rates rose slightly to 5.7 percent, while hourly wages stayed relatively stable—up 0.5 percent.
This afternoon, however, S&P adjusted Greece’s credit rating down from a B to a B-, in the wake of the decision by European banks to no longer accept Greek debt as collateral for loans.
While the jobs report is expected to be the highlight of the day on Wall Street, consumer credit figures will be released as well this afternoon, while Moody’s will post 4th-quarter earnings figures.
As of 2 p.m., here are the numbers on Wall Street:
Dow Jones Industrial Average: 17,860.06 (-24.82)
NASDAQ: 4,757.79 (-7.31)
S&P 500: 2,062.26 (-0.26)
