Wall Street swung between losses and gains in volatile trading on Friday that traders blamed on the expiration of stock futures and options, with only the defensive sectors staying higher consistently, highlighting concerns over slowing growth. The S&P 500 was up much as 1.5 percent at its highest, before falling 0.36 percent to a session low. The S&P and Dow Industrials though stayed higher for most of the session, while the Nasdaq, which came within a whisker of confirming bear market territory on Thursday, was largely lower.
The volatility was mainly due to "quadruple-witching" - when options on stocks and indexes as well as futures on indexes and single-stocks for the quarter all expire - which tends to raise volatility and trading volumes as investors replace expiring positions.
"We had a bit of a bounce, but it's options expiration, so I don't expect the market to regain any substantial strength from the recent selloff," said Peter Cardillo, chief market economist at Spartan Capital Securities in New York.
"Volatility is probably going to be accompanying the movements in the market today."
The markets opened higher and hit session highs after New York Federal Reserve President John Williams said the central bank is open to reassessing its views and listening to market signals that the economy could fall short of expectations. However, he said that for now further rate hikes appear appropriate. Williams' comments on CNBC come after the Fed said on Wednesday it would largely stick to its plan to keep raising interest rates, spooking investors already grappling with mounting evidence of slowing growth and triggering a two-day slide on Wall Street.
Most of the markets gyrations came as the technology index and the communication services index, which house high-growth names such as Facebook Inc and Alphabet Inc, swung between gains and losses. At 11:45 a.m. ET, the Dow Jones Industrial Average was up 72.11 points, or 0.32 percent, at 22,931.71, the S&P 500 was up 0.88 points, or 0.04 percent, at 2,468.30 and the Nasdaq Composite was down 57.66 points, or 0.88 percent, at 6,470.75.