Wall Street’s main indices fell for a fifth straight session on Friday and posted their biggest weekly declines since the market tumbled at the end of last year, as a weak US jobs report ignited more concerns about the global economy.
However, Friday’s declines were only slight. Stocks significantly pared losses late in the day as investors reassessed the employment report and considered whether the market’s recent slump was ending.
The eventful session came as some Wall Street watchers prepared to celebrate the 10-year anniversary of the start of the S&P 500’s bull market run that took root during the financial crisis.
US employment growth almost stalled last month, with the economy creating only 20,000 jobs, adding to signs of a sharp slowdown in economic activity in the first quarter of the year. The payroll gains reported by the US Department of Labor were the weakest since September 2017.
The weak US report added to economic fears also fanned by a sharp fall in China’s exports and after the European Central Bank slashed growth forecasts for the region on Thursday.
“People are worried about the jobs report and global growth in general and that is pushing markets lower,” said Brent Schutte, chief investment strategist at Northwestern Mutual Wealth Management Co in Milwaukee.
However, stocks finished well above their lows for the session, as investors noted that the jobs report was affected by seasonal factors and the federal government shutdown.
“As people take a step away from the headline number, they say: ‘Hey, this is just one report. The economy is likely not as weak as this one report would suggest,’” said Keith Lerner, chief market strategist at SunTrust Advisory Services in Atlanta, Georgia.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average on Friday fell 22.99 points, or 0.09 percent, to 25,450.24, the S&P 500 lost 5.86 points, or 0.21 percent, to 2,743.07 and the NASDAQ Composite dropped 13.32 points, or 0.18 percent, to 7,408.14.
For the week, the Dow Jones and the S&P both fell 2.2 percent, and the NASDAQ lost 2.5 percent, ending a 10-week streak of weekly gains.
The closely watched Dow Jones Transportation Average on Friday fell 0.5 percent, dropping for an 11th straight session, its longest streak of declines since 1972, according to S&P Dow Jones Indices.
The recent pullback has paused a rally to start this year that has been fueled by optimism over a US-China trade deal and by beliefs the US Federal Reserve will be less aggressive in raising interest rates.
The S&P 500 is up 9.4 percent this year.
“In the first part of the year, what we have largely done is clawed back what we lost in the fourth quarter that was based upon geopolitical and Federal Reserve fears that are now ebbing,” Schutte said.
Energy fell the most among the 11 major sectors, declining 2 percent as oil prices also fell.
Exxon Mobil Corp shares dropped 1.4 percent and were among the biggest drags on the S&P.
Utilities led gains among the sectors, while two other defensive groups, consumer staples and real estate, finished positive.
In corporate news, Costco Wholesale Corp shares rose 5.1 percent after the warehouse club operator’s quarterly profit topped estimates.
Declining issues outnumbered advancing ones on the New York Stock Exchange by a 1.35-to-1 ratio; on NASDAQ, a 1.21-to-1 ratio favored decliners.
The S&P 500 posted six new 52-week highs and five new lows; the NASDAQ Composite recorded 28 new highs and 51 new lows.
About 7.1 billion shares changed hands in US exchanges on Friday, below the 7.3 billion daily average over the past 20 sessions.
Among the rows of vibrators, rubber torsos and leather harnesses at a Chinese sex toys exhibition in Shanghai this weekend, the beginnings of an artificial intelligence (AI)-driven shift in the industry quietly pulsed. China manufactures about 70 percent of the world’s sex toys, most of it the “hardware” on display at the fair — whether that be technicolor tentacled dildos or hyper-realistic personalized silicone dolls. Yet smart toys have been rising in popularity for some time. Many major European and US brands already offer tech-enhanced products that can enable long-distance love, monitor well-being and even bring people one step closer to
Malaysia’s leader yesterday announced plans to build a massive semiconductor design park, aiming to boost the Southeast Asian nation’s role in the global chip industry. A prominent player in the semiconductor industry for decades, Malaysia accounts for an estimated 13 percent of global back-end manufacturing, according to German tech giant Bosch. Now it wants to go beyond production and emerge as a chip design powerhouse too, Malaysian Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim said. “I am pleased to announce the largest IC (integrated circuit) Design Park in Southeast Asia, that will house world-class anchor tenants and collaborate with global companies such as Arm [Holdings PLC],”
Sales in the retail, and food and beverage sectors last month continued to rise, increasing 0.7 percent and 13.6 percent respectively from a year earlier, setting record highs for the month of March, the Ministry of Economic Affairs said yesterday. Sales in the wholesale sector also grew last month by 4.6 annually, mainly due to the business opportunities for emerging applications related to artificial intelligence (AI) and high-performance computing technologies, the ministry said in a report. The ministry forecast that retail, and food and beverage sales this month would retain their growth momentum as the former would benefit from Tomb Sweeping Day
Thousands of parents in Singapore are furious after a Cordlife Group Ltd (康盛人生集團), a major operator of cord blood banks in Asia, irreparably damaged their children’s samples through improper handling, with some now pursuing legal action. The ongoing case, one of the worst to hit the largely untested industry, has renewed concerns over companies marketing themselves to anxious parents with mostly unproven assurances. This has implications across the region, given Cordlife’s operations in Hong Kong, Macau, Indonesia, the Philippines and India. The parents paid for years to have their infants’ cord blood stored, with the understanding that the stem cells they contained