Stocks End Rough Quarter On High Note -- U.S. Commentary

(RTTNews) - U.S. stocks rallied Thursday ahead of the Easter Break, led by big names like Boeing and Apple.

Wall Street ended a rough first quarter on a high note. For the week, Dow ended up 2.7%, S&P 500 rose 2.1% and Nasdaq inched up 1%. However, for the first quarter the Dow was 2.3% lower.

Recent pessimism about the tech sector may have been way overblown, while higher oil prices helped energy stocks trim this quarter's losses.

Microsoft (MSFT) rose more than 2 percent on reports of a reorganzation within the company. Facebook (FB) stemmed its supposed collapse with a gain of about 5%.

Nvidia (NVDA) steadied after CEO Jensen Huang said Uber Technologies does not use the company's self-driving platform architecture.

However, it was a roller coaster ride for Amazon (AMZN). The stock fought back from steep early losses as President Donald Trump tweeted that he is "concerned" about the company's tax breaks. Shares were down about 9 percent this week.

Apple Inc. (AAPL) is revamping privacy controls for its devices and cloud services to comply with strict new European rules.

Constellation Brands (STX) rose after the spirits producer reported fiscal fourth quarter results that beat analyst estimates on both the top and bottom lines.

In economic news, first-time claims for U.S. unemployment benefits unexpectedly edged lower in the week ended March 24th, according to a report released by the Labor Department on Thursday.

The report said initial jobless claims dipped to 215,000, a decrease of 12,000 from the previous week's revised level of 227,000.

A reading on inflation said to be preferred by the Federal Reserve showed the annual rate of core consumer price growth accelerated to 1.6 percent in February from 1.5 percent in January.

Personal income climbed by 0.4 percent in February, matching the increases seen in the two previous months as well as expectations.

The Commerce Department also said personal spending rose by 0.2 percent for the second consecutive month. The uptick in spending also matched estimates.

Crude oil futures rose near $65 Thursday after a surprising decline in the U.S. oil rig count.

That's after Baker Hughes said that the number of active U.S. rigs drilling for oil fell by seven to 797 this week.