US Stocks Drop as Technology, Consumer Discretionary Hit Hard; Fed Expected to Boost Taper Despite Weak November Jobs Report

US stocks fell amid a sharp sell-off in technology and consumer discretionary names, pushing broad indexes into a weekly decline, and government bond yields slumped on concern November's disappointing jobs report may fail to stop the Federal Reserve from accelerating the tapering of its asset purchases.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 0.2% to 34,580.08, with S&P 500 down 0.8% and the Nasdaq Composite 1.9% lower at the close of trading on Friday. All three indexes were off their intraday lows, especially the Dow, which was down more than 1% earlier in the session.

Consumer staples and utilities led the gainers. Healthcare, which was in the red earlier in the session, ended the day higher. No other sector was in the green.

The 10-year US Treasury yield plunged 9.3 basis points to just under 1.36%.

Nonfarm payrolls rose by 210,000, below the 550,000 jobs jump expected in a survey compiled by Bloomberg, while October payrolls saw an upward revision to 546,000. The survey was carried out Nov. 7-13, two weeks before the omicron variant was reported.

Fed Chair Jerome Powell said earlier this week that the Fed will be open to the idea of accelerating the process of reducing monthly asset purchases. The discussion is likely to take place at the Fed's policy meeting in mid December.

"Even though this [November jobs report] is an outlier, it's not bad enough to spook the Fed," Wells Fargo's Michael Schumacher was cited as saying in a report from CNBC. "Unless you get some awful news on the virus and some awful print on CPI, they probably do accelerate the taper."

The World Health Organization reported Friday that omicron variant has been detected in 38 countries, up from 23 two days ago, with early data suggesting the strain is more contagious than delta.

West Texas Intermediate crude oil fell by $0.41 to $66.09 a barrel, giving up earlier gains of more than $1 a barrel.

In company news, DocuSign's DOCU revenue guidance came in lighter than expected as demand slowed after six quarters of acceleration, prompting the Electronic signatures firm to respond by investing aggressively in its salesforce. Shares plunged 42% at the close, the steepest decliner on Nasdaq.

The biggest gainer on the index was Marvell Technology MRVL, whose shares surged 18%. The company's end-to-end platform approach to core cloud, 5G and auto supports long-term structural growth following its "break-out" Q3 results and outlook, Oppenheimer said in a note to clients on Friday.

In the metals markets, gold was up 1.2% to $1,783.80, and silver was up 0.8% to $22.45 an ounce but copper was down 0.7% to $4.27 per pound. Among energy ETFs, the United States Oil Fund was down 0.6% to $48.01 and the United States Natural Gas Fund was down 0.1% to $13.34.