Rough Week Ends With Reassurance From Fed

Wall Street rose on Friday, but only after careening through another wild day. It was a fitting ending to a brutal week of scary swings dominated by worries about the US economy and uncertainty about what President Trump will do with tariffs.

• The Dow rose 222.64 points, or 0.5%, to 42,801.72. For the week, it's down 2.4%.
• The S&P 500 rose 31.68 points, or 0.6%, to 5,770.20, finishing the week down 3.1%.
• The Nasdaq rose 126.97 points, or 0.7%, to 18,196.22, a drop for the week of 3.5%.

The head of the Federal Reserve helped ease the market's worries on Friday afternoon by saying that he thinks the economy looks stable at the moment and that he doesn't feel pressure to cut interest rates in order to prop it up, the AP reports. Traders in recent weeks had been building bets the Fed would have to cut its main rate more than three times this year following a stream of weaker-than-expected reports on the economy. But Jerome Powell pushed back on speculation he and other Fed officials could feel pressure to act soon. "The costs of being cautious are very, very low" right now, Powell said about holding steady on interest rates. "The economy is fine. It doesn't need us to do anything really. We can wait, and we should wait."

On Wall Street, Walgreens Boots Alliance climbed 7.5% after the pharmacy and drugstore chain agreed to be acquired by private equity firm Sycamore Partners. The buyout would take the struggling company private for the first time since 1927 and give it more flexibility to make changes to improve its business without worrying about Wall Street's reaction. Broadcom rose 8.6% after delivering stronger profit and revenue for the latest quarter than analysts expected. The chip company also gave a forecast for upcoming revenue that topped analysts' expectation, thanks in part to strong demand for its artificial-intelligence offerings. They helped offset Hewlett Packard Enterprises, which slumped 12% after reporting profit for the latest quarter that fell just short of analysts' expectations. Costco sank 6.1% after the retailer reported a weaker profit for the latest quarter than expected.

(More Wall Street stories.)