What Happened in the Stock Market Today

Stocks dipped on Friday, as both the Dow Jones Industrial Average (^DJI +0.68%) and the **S&P 500 **(^GSPC +0.68%) indexes finished lower by less than 0.5%.

Today's stock market

| Index | Percentage Change | Point Change | | --- | --- | --- | | Dow | (0.31%) | (65.27) | | S&P 500 | (0.23%) | (5.34) |

Data source: Yahoo! Finance.

Financial stocks trailed the market by a slight margin, and so the popular Financial Select Sector SPDR ETF (XLF +0.84%) declined by 0.8%. Gold prices rose slightly, which helped the leveraged bet on the precious metal, Direxion Daily Gold Miners Bull 3X ETF (NUGT +10.48%), rise close to 3%.

As for individual stocks,** Franklin Covey **(FC 17.61%) posted market-thumping gains following the release of fresh quarterly earnings.

Image source: Getty Images.

Franklin Covey's business-model shift

Franklin Covey shares spiked 26% to regain nearly all the ground they had lost in 2017. The catalyst for the jump was the business performance software specialist's announcement of fiscal second-quarter earnings results. Sales and profit figures met management's targets, with revenue dipping slightly to $42.2 million from $45.3 million a year ago, and operating loss expanding to $4.5 million from $0.3 million.

Results were held back by strong demand for Franklin Covey's new product offering that provides unlimited access to a wide range of its intellectual property for a specified period of time. Contracts for that pass more than doubled to $7.8 million.

The bad news is the shift toward this "all access" product hurts revenue and profits in the short term. However, executives believe it's ultimately a great move for the business. The transition "will provide growth in future periods through higher initial sale sizes, consistently strong renewals, and from sales of add-on services and training materials," CEO Bob Whitman said in a press release. The recent quarter provides a good example of that last point, as the company booked $3.5 million worth of add-on materials attached to all-access pass sales. Investors expressed their optimism that Franklin Covey could see sharper growth ahead by bidding the stock past $20 per share on Friday.

US300.04%
US5000.10%
XLF1.44%
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