Friday's Financial Winners & Losers

Updated from 1:29 p.m. EDT

A number of financial stocks were hit with downgrades Friday as the sector slid downward in near synchronization with the broad indices.

Blackstone (BX Quote) was an exception, however, launching with a bang today in its initial public offering. The asset manager priced some 133.3 million shares at $31 apiece -- the high end of its expected range -- and closed up 13.1% to $35.06.

New York investment bank Greenhill (GHL Quote) was upped to outperform from market perform at Wachovia, boosting shares by 4.7% to $68.48, and Corus Bankshares (CORS Quote) added 5.4% on word of a special $1-per-share cash dividend to holders of record as of July 18. Shares of the Chicago-based bank closed up 89 cents to $17.25.

Among other scarce financial winners today, student lender First Marblehead (FMD Quote) gained 3.8% to $40.66; tax preparer H&R Block (HRB Quote) tacked on 2.3% to $22.54; and insurer Sun Life Financial (SLF Quote) added 1.3% to $47.33.

But the NYSE Financial Sector Index plunged 138.76 points, or 1.4%, to 9640.41. The KBW Bank Index was off 1.7% at 113.56. Its components include Boston's State Street (STT Quote), which lost 1.6% to $68.32 despite adding a penny to its per-share dividend at 22 cents.

Elsewhere, PrivateBancorp (PVTB Quote) tumbled 5.4% to $28.42 after Robert W. Baird cut the Chicago bank to neutral from outperform. Meanwhile, Jefferies and Piper Jaffray respectively doled out downgrades to nonprime auto-finance firm United Panam Financial (UPFC Quote), which shed 5.4%, and insurer Fidelity National Financial (FNF Quote), off 2.1%.