Stocks Opened Lower, Ford Profits Missed

U.S. stocks opened lower on Friday as a number of bellwether names, including Ford, fell following their quarterly results, overshadowing positive numbers from Microsoft. The Dow Jones Industrial Average lately shed 112.99 points, or 0.68%, to 16,388.66. The S&P 500 was off 9.59 points, or 0.51%,  to 1,873.11. The Nasdaq Composite fell 33.56 points, or 0.81%, to 4,114.77.

Ford Motor Co posted lower-than-expected first-quarter profit on Friday as the No. 2 U.S. automaker saw higher warranty costs in North America for older vehicles by $400 million. Net income fell 39 percent to $989 million, or 24 cents a share, from $1.61 billion, or 40 cents a share, in the
year-earlier period.

Microsoft announced its third-quarter 2014 earnings, beating EPS estimates, while revenues were in line with estimates. Overall, sales of Windows OS saw growth and cloud picked up momentum. The company reported revenues of $20.4 billion with EPS of 68 cents, whereas analysts were projecting revenues of $20.4 billion and EPS of 63 cents.

A new ranking of the competitiveness of the world’s top 25 exporting countries says the United States is once again a “rising star” of global manufacturing thanks to falling domestic natural gas prices, rising worker productivity and a lack of upward wage pressure.