Equity markets continued their uneven climb upward this year with the tech-heavy Nasdaq and the S&P 500, which has a hefty technology component, jumping 1.8% and 1.1%, respectively, even as fourth quarter earnings continued to tilt negative and a rising number of firms announced layoffs in anticipation of an economic contraction. Since the start of the year, Amazon, Microsoft, Salesforce and more recently IBM have announced job cuts.