Financials Higher Ahead of Jobs Data -- Financials Roundup

Banks, lenders and other financial companies rose as traders bet jobs data Friday would support higher interest rates.

The price of digital currency bitcoin rose as much as 40% in a matter of hours in what some observers said was a textbook example of speculative bubble formation. Many analysts had warned of a bubble when bitcoin hit $5,000. On Thursday, it traded as high as $18,000 on some exchanges. More than $300 million of the Bitcoin Investment Trust, a fund designed to track the price of bitcoin like an ETF, had changed hands in over-the-counter trading, enough to make it one of the top 10 exchange-traded funds by volume. The fund has traditionally traded at a large premium to bitcoin because it provides ease of access to investors, but that premium could evaporate once futures start trading at major exchange operated by CBOE Holdings next week.

One of China's biggest insurers, Ping An Insurance, has become the second-largest shareholder of British banking giant HSBC Holdings.

Rob Curran, rob.curran@dowjones.com

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

December 07, 2017 16:42 ET (21:42 GMT)