Bay Area companies such as Tesla, Netflix and Roku started the week off with solid gains on the stock market Monday, but lingering concerns about the fallout that the coronavirus crisis could have on the economy continued to cast a pall over Wall Street.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 202 points, or almost 1%, to 23,521.48, and the S&P 500 was down by 0.5%, at 2,817.89 as investors showed consternation over the possible long-term effects of coronavirus upon several major U.S. industries. The fears were also stoked by legendary investor Warren Buffett, who over the weekend divulged that his Berkshire Hathaway holding company had sold all of its shares in air carriers United, American, Delta and Southwest due to the effect coronavirus has had on the industry.
But, the Nasdaq Composite Index, which includes many big-name local tech companies, was up by 0.6%, at 8,658.11.
Tesla was among the advancers, as the electric carmaker’s shares rose 5.6%, to $740.87, just days after Chief Executive Elon Musk let loose with a tweetstorm in which he said Tesla’s stock price was too high, and that he was going to sell nearly all of his material possessions. Those tweets helped shave more than 10% off of Tesla’s share price on Friday.
Netflix climbed by almost 3%, to $426.75 a share, and Roku shares surged by 7.5%, to $122.53 in the wake of some industry analysts saying that the streaming TV companies are likely to see more visitors, and usage, as stay-at-home orders remain in effect around much of the country.
Around the Bay Area, and the state, the pace of new coronavirus cases continued to slow, with 1,254 new cases statewide reported on Sunday, down 14% from Saturday. The number of deaths across California also fell to 23 on Sunday from 98 on Saturday.
Among other companies in the region, Apple shares rose 1%, to $291.63, Facebook was up by 0.6%, at $203.58 a share, HP edged up by 0.3%, to $14.76 a share, Twitter shares rose 0.5%, to $27.99 and AMD climbed 3.4%, to $51.58.
