By Carla Mozee, MarketWatch
LOS ANGELES (MarketWatch) — Standard & Poor’s late Friday delivered an anticipated downgrade of sovereign-debt ratings of several euro-zone nations late Friday, prompting a quick pullback in the European single currency.
Several exchange-traded funds tracking the U.S. stock market tipped higher.
The euro EURUSD -.00% lost ground against the dollar following the ratings announcements but it soon rebounded to 1.2675 against the dollar. The dollar index DXY +0.79% , which tracks the U.S. unit against a basket of six major rivals, rose to 81.51, slightly easing from a spike to 81.54. Read more on currencies.
S&P cut the triple-A ratings of France and Austria, and downgraded Spain, Italy, and Portugal. France and Austria are now both rated AA+, Spain is at A, and Italy is rated BBB+. Portugal’s rating was dropped to a junk grade of BB. Read more on downgrades.
The moves had been anticipated after the ratings agency placed 15 euro-zone countries on watch for possible downgrades in early December.
Late Friday, the SPDR S&P 500 Trust SPY +0.30% , which tracks the S&P 500 Index, rose 0.3% and the PowerShares QQQ Trust QQQ +0.19% , which tracks the Nasdaq 100, rose 0.14%. Also, the Financial Select Sector SPDR XLF +0.11% , which follows financial stocks in the S&P 500 Index SPX -0.50% , rose 0.1%.
Stocks on the broader market fell in the regular session after reports that Standard & Poor’s was set to downgrade a number of sovereign ratings. The Dow Jones Industrial Average DJIA -0.39% closed 49 points, or 0.4%, lower at 12,422.06. The S&P 500 Index SPX -0.50% fell 0.5% to 1,289.09 and the Nasdaq Composite Index COMP -0.52% gave up 0.5% to 2,710.67. Read more on U.S. stocks.
Carla Mozee is a reporter for MarketWatch, based in Los Angeles.
