
Stocks opened Friday in positive territory and stayed there through the early close. Volume was understandably light on Black Friday, but those who did show up for the abbreviated session were in the mood to buy tech stocks, with that sector handily outperforming.
The bulk of the gains for the technology sector came from semiconductor stocks. The group rallied after a Bloomberg report suggested the Biden administration may impose sanctions on sales of semiconductor equipment and artificial intelligence (AI) memory chips to China that are not as restrictive as previously proposed.