Stocks Sink as Social Media Weighs on Tech Sector By

© Reuters.

By Liz Moyer 

-- U.S. stocks sank on Friday, dragged down by tech as social media weighed on the sector.

At 2:56 PM ET, the Dow Jones Industrial Average was down 230 points, or 0.7%, while the S&P 500 was down 1.3%, and the NASDAQ Composite fell 2.2%.

Snap, Inc. (NYSE:SNAP) shares tumbled 39% after it said inflation and competition hurt advertising demand, and it declined to forecast results. It was its slowest ever sales growth as a publicly traded company. Snap, the owner of the disappearing message app Snapchat, said it’s going to cut back on hiring, as have other large media companies.

Twitter, Inc. (NYSE:TWTR) missed expectations for profit, revenue, and user growth and blamed its performance in part on its battle with Elon Musk for chasing away advertisers. The company is suing Musk in Delaware to force him to make good on his $44 billion takeover, which he wants to scrap.

Twitter shares rose 1%. Revenue of $1.18 billion fell short of the $1.33 billion forecast.

Other social media stocks were falling, including Meta Platforms, Inc. (NASDAQ:META), down 7%.

In a broader view, so far 91 S&P 500 companies have reported earnings and more than three-quarters of them have beaten expectations, Reuters reported.

Oil fell. Crude Oil WTI Futures fell 1.6%, to $94.78 a barrel and Brent Oil Futures fell 0.5% to $103.30 a barrel. Gold Futures rose 0.5%, to $1,721 an ounce.

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