Wall Street retreated on Friday as lower oil prices weighed on energy shares and Facebook Inc and Apple Inc declined, but major indices still posted gains for the week.
Energy was the worst performing major S&P sector, dropping 1.3 percent. Oil prices tumbled 4 percent on signs that Saudi Arabia and Iran were making little progress on a bilateral agreement ahead of talks by crude exporters aimed at freezing production.
Facebook shares fell 1.6 percent and were one of the biggest drags on the S&P 500.
The Wall Street Journal reported that the social media company overestimated viewing times for video ads.
Even so, the S&P 500 recorded its best weekly performance in more than two months. Stocks were given a boost on Wednesday when the US Federal Reserve decided to keep rates steady, leaving intact the low-interest-rate environment that has helped fuel the bull market.
“I just think after a few strong days and a little weakness in energy that folks are taking some profit before the weekend,” said Gary Bradshaw, portfolio manager with Hodges Capital Management in Dallas, Texas. “I just feel like the market is going to keep grinding higher.”
The Dow Jones industrial average ended down 131.01 points, or 0.71 percent, at 18,261.45, the S&P 500 lost 12.49 points, or 0.57 percent, to 2,164.69 and the NASDAQ Composite dropped 33.78 points, or 0.63 percent, to 5,305.75.
For the year, the benchmark S&P 500 is up about 6 percent. With the highly anticipated Fed decision now past, investors are turning toward the upcoming corporate earnings season and US presidential election, with the first debate tomorrow.
“We have a lot of noise coming in with the end of the quarter and the debate,” said Bucky Hellwig, senior vice president at BB&T Wealth Management in Birmingham, Alabama. “But given what the Fed has done, I think we have volatility with a bias to the upside.”
Nine of 11 major S&P sectors ended lower. The tech sector fell about 1 percent, with Apple shares down 1.7 percent on concerns about iPhone sales.
Twitter Inc shares surged 21 percent on reports that the microblogging company had initiated talks with several technology companies to explore selling itself.
Google parent Alphabet Inc ended unchanged, while Salesforce dropped 5.6 percent after both were reported to have shown interest in buying Twitter.
Oil-linked stocks retreated, with petroleum prices, as Halliburton Co shed 1.9 percent and ConocoPhillips declined 2.6 percent.
Dow member Procter & Gamble Co (P&G) fell 1.4 percent following a report from Bloomberg News that said P&G brands in skin care and men’s shaving were losing US market share to competitors.
Yahoo Inc sank 3.1 percent following the Thursday disclosure that hackers took data on at least 500 million users, one of the biggest thefts of personal data ever.
Marriott International Inc shed 1.9 percent after announcing it completed its US$13.6 billion takeover of Starwood Hotels & Resorts Worldwide Inc.
Endo International PLC shares jumped more than 15 percent after the drugmaker announced a new chief executive.
Declining issues outnumbered advancing ones on the NYSE by a 2.13-to-1 ratio; on NASDAQ, a 1.67-to-1 ratio favored decliners.
The S&P 500 posted seven new 52-week highs and one new low; the NASDAQ Composite recorded 88 new highs and 13 new lows.
About 6.3 billion shares changed hands on US exchanges, below the 6.9 billion daily average for the past 20 trading days, according to Thomson Reuters data.
Additional reporting by AFP
Stephen Garrett, a 27-year-old graduate student, always thought he would study in China, but first the country’s restrictive COVID-19 policies made it nearly impossible and now he has other concerns. The cost is one deterrent, but Garrett is more worried about restrictions on academic freedom and the personal risk of being stranded in China. He is not alone. Only about 700 American students are studying at Chinese universities, down from a peak of nearly 25,000 a decade ago, while there are nearly 300,000 Chinese students at US schools. Some young Americans are discouraged from investing their time in China by what they see
MAJOR DROP: CEO Tim Cook, who is visiting Hanoi, pledged the firm was committed to Vietnam after its smartphone shipments declined 9.6% annually in the first quarter Apple Inc yesterday said it would increase spending on suppliers in Vietnam, a key production hub, as CEO Tim Cook arrived in the country for a two-day visit. The iPhone maker announced the news in a statement on its Web site, but gave no details of how much it would spend or where the money would go. Cook is expected to meet programmers, content creators and students during his visit, online newspaper VnExpress reported. The visit comes as US President Joe Biden’s administration seeks to ramp up Vietnam’s role in the global tech supply chain to reduce the US’ dependence on China. Images on
New apartments in Taiwan’s major cities are getting smaller, while old apartments are increasingly occupied by older people, many of whom live alone, government data showed. The phenomenon has to do with sharpening unaffordable property prices and an aging population, property brokers said. Apartments with one bedroom that are two years old or older have gained a noticeable presence in the nation’s six special municipalities as well as Hsinchu county and city in the past five years, Evertrust Rehouse Co (永慶房產集團) found, citing data from the government’s real-price transaction platform. In Taipei, apartments with one bedroom accounted for 19 percent of deals last
US CONSCULTANT: The US Department of Commerce’s Ursula Burns is a rarely seen US government consultant to be put forward to sit on the board, nominated as an independent director Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電), the world’s largest contract chipmaker, yesterday nominated 10 candidates for its new board of directors, including Ursula Burns from the US Department of Commerce. It is rare that TSMC has nominated a US government consultant to sit on its board. Burns was nominated as one of seven independent directors. She is vice chair of the department’s Advisory Council on Supply Chain Competitiveness. Burns is to stand for election at TSMC’s annual shareholders’ meeting on June 4 along with the rest of the candidates. TSMC chairman Mark Liu (劉德音) was not on the list after in December last