Finance

The tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite led Wall Street's gains at the end of the week, rising 1.2% to close near its all-time high and marking its third consecutive positive week. Meanwhile, the broader S&P 500 rose 0.7% and the blue-chip Dow Jones Industrial Average added 0.5% on Friday. Despite the end-of-week surge, both the Dow and the S&P 500 booked overall weekly losses, declining 1.3% and 0.3% respectively.

Crude oil benchmarks finished the week lower, down about 1.5% for West Texas Intermediate, after G-7 and European nations agreed to release 100 million barrels of crude and diesel from strategic stockpiles. This action was aimed at curbing supply pressures stems from global geopolitical tensions and an increasingly tight global diesel market. Other commodities moved down in tandem, with gold dropping to $4,170 an ounce and silver logging losses over the full week.

Shares of chip design firm Broadcom advanced approximately 3.5%, helping spark a broader 2% gain in the iShares Semiconductor ETF. The stock's positive performance followed reports that the company's financial syndicate is starting to assemble an estimated $60 billion in specialized artificial intelligence chip financing aimed at Anthropic and other development platforms. Conversely, other memory players like Seagate and Western Digital slid following reports of increased production from overseas competition.