Adam Shell

USA TODAY

U.S. stocks closed flat Friday, but the broad market still finished the week higher, snapping its weekly losing streak at two, with the market swinging up and down as good earnings reports from some companies were offset by others that fell short of Wall Street forecasts.

On Friday, the broad Standard & Poor's 500 stock index fell less than 1 point, or virtually unchanged to 2141.16, but still finished the week up 0.4%. The Nasdaq composite also posted gains this week, rising 0.8% after a nearly 16-point gain to 5257.40. The Dow Jones industrial average also finished the week fractionally higher despite tumbling 16.64 points Friday to 18,145.71.

The past week on Wall Street was dominated by the first big onslaught of third-quarter profit reports, with Wall Street cheering better-than-expected reports from well-known blue chip companies like Microsoft and McDonalds, a trio of beats from financial giants American Express (AXP), Morgan Stanley (MS) and Goldman Sachs (GS), and video streaming service Netflix (NFLX).

Those earnigns "beats," however, were dimmed by less-robust results from Verizon (VZ), which reported disappointing wireless subscription gains, chip maker Intel (INTC), which lowered its full-year profit outlook, and a "miss" from conglomerate General Electric (GE).

Wall Street is readying for another big round of earnings reports next week, with nearly 180 S&P companies reporting, including iPhone maker Apple (APPL), automaker General Motors (GM), softdrink giant Coca-Cola (KO)and tech giants Amazon.com (AMZN) and Google parent Alphabet (GOOGL).

The good news on earnings is that the third-quarter growth rate of the S&P 500 turned into positive territory at +1.1%, according to earnings tracker Thomson Reuters. The shift to positive growth boosted hopes that the so-called profit recession for Corporate America will end at four quarters.

Microsoft shares surge past 1999 high

Also weighing on stocks was a rise in the value of the U.S. dollar vs. a basket of foreign currencies to a seven-month high as traders started to price in the first interest rate hike of 2016 from the Federal Reserve later this year. The dollar's rise also coincided with hints from European Central Bank President Mario Draghi on Thursday that suggess the ECB is considering extending its asset purchase program, which is designed to boost growth and inflation, beyond its estimated end date of March 2017.

Wall Street will be also keeping close tabs on the state of the presidential and Congressional election races as the Nov. 8 voting day nears.

U.S. bond yields were down, and the 10-year Treasury note dipped to 1.737%