U.S. stocks slide on final trading day of 2017
Wall Street capped 2017 with a loss, weighed down by a broad slide in light trading ahead of the New Year’s holiday. Technology companies, banks and health care stocks accounted for much of the market’s decline. Energy stocks also fell, even as the price of U.S. crude oil surged to its highest level in more than two years.
Despite the downbeat end to the week, the U.S. stock market finished 2017 with its strongest year since 2013.
Wall Street has taken stock investors on a mostly smooth, record-shattering ride in 2017. The major stock indexes made double-digit gains for the year, led by Apple, Facebook and other technology stocks.
“This would go in the category of stellar year, with very little volatility in the market and pullbacks that were essentially minor,” said Quincy Krosby, chief market strategist at Prudential Financial.
Several factors kept the market on an upward grind for most of the year and repeatedly drove stock indexes to all-time highs. The global economy rebounded, while the U.S. economy and job market continued to strengthen, which helped drive strong corporate earnings growth.
Investors also drew encouragement from the Trump administration’s and Republican-led Congress’ push to slash corporate taxes, roll back regulations and enact other pro-business policies. Congress
passed the $1.5 trillion tax overhaul bill, which reduces corporate taxes from 35 percent to 21 percent, last week.
The Standard & Poor’s 500 index, the broadest measure of the stock market, gained 19.4 percent for the year, more than double its gain in 2016. Including dividends, the total return was 22.5 percent, as of late Thursday.
The Dow Jones industrial average ended the year with a 25.1 percent gain, setting 71 all-time highs along the way.
The Nasdaq composite notched the biggest gain, an increase of 28.2 percent, while the Russell 2000 index of smaller-company stocks closed out 2017 with a gain of 13.1 percent.
“It’s been the year that surprised everybody,” said J.J. Kinahan, chief market strategist at TD
Ameritrade. “It was truly buy-onthe-dip, and that paid off better than anyone possibly expected.”
On Friday, many investors opted to pocket some of their gains, especially in technology stocks, which led the market with a gain of 36.9 percent. Traders also sold off health care and financials stocks, both of which rose 20 percent this year. Health care management company Centene fell $2.02, or 2 percent, to $100.88, while SunTrust Banks gave up 85 cents, or 1.3 percent, to $64.59.
“We’ve seen a little bit of a rotation from growth back to some of the more defensive names, so it’s not surprising to see some … redistribution to areas that generally haven’t participated,” said Eric Wiegand, senior portfolio manager for Private Wealth Management at U.S. Bank.
The dollar finished the year weaker for the first time since 2012. The ICE U.S. Dollar Index, which compares the value of the dollar to a basket of major currencies, declined nearly 10 percent this year, its biggest drop since 2003.
On Friday, the U.S. currency fell to 112.64 yen from 112.87 yen on Thursday. The euro strengthened to $1.2012 from $1.1952.
Major stock indexes in Europe finished mixed Friday. For 2017, Britain’s notched a gain of 7.6 percent, while indexes in Germany and France closed the year with gains of 12.5 percent and 9.3 percent, respectively.