Stock market continues to sink amid uncertaint y
Trade war with China, impeachment inquiry both drags on economy
A day of choppy trading on Wall Street ended Monday with stocks broadly lower as t he market extended its losing streak into a fourth week.
Technology stocks, consumer goods makers, healthcare companies and banks accounted for much of t he selling , which accelerated in t he last hour of trading , erasing modest gains f rom midday. Communication services stocks eked out as light gain, bucking the broader market slide. Crude oil prices edged lower and bond yields rose.
The market is coming of f a three-weeks kid following a mostly discouraging batch of economic data t hat stoked investors’ worries that as lowdown in U.S. economic growth could worsen.
The combination of uncertainty over the costly trade war between the U.S. and China, and the impeachment inquiry drama unfolding in Washington, is likely to continue to drag on the economy and weigh on markets, said Tony Roth, chief investment officer at Wilmington Trust.
“And that’ s why the markets are treading water rig ht now, waiting to see if another shoe drops ,” Roth said.
The S& P 500 fell 13.22 points, or 0.4 percent, to 2,938.79. The Dow Jones Industrial Averages lid 95.70 points, or 0.4 percent, to 26,478.02. The Nasdaq dropped 26.18 points, or 0.3 percent, to 7,956.29.
Smaller- company stocks fared slightly better than the rest of t he market. The Russell 2000 index slipped 2.91 points, or 0.2 percent, to 1,497.79.
Bond prices fell, pushing t he yield on the 10- year Treasury to 1.56 percent f rom 1.51 percent.
The benchmark S& P 500 index began the day lower, picked up some gains around midday and then veered back into the red by late afternoon.
The wobbly day in t he market reflects the cautious approach that investors are taking as they try tog au ge how the economy and corporate profits will fare amid t he lingering trade war and political uncertainty in Washing ton.
Last week, the S& P 500 posted its first back-to-back losses of 1 percent t his year as surprisingly weak numbers in surveys of manufacturing and service industries showed the U.S .- China trade war is threatening U.S. economic growth.
Some of those fears were allayed on Friday when a government jobs report showed that employers are still adding jobs at a healthy clip and that the national unemployment rate dropped to a five-decade low.
Still, last week marked t he third weekly loss in a row for the broader market as the trade war takes its toll on confidence. Markets have been whipsawed for months by t he ups and down sin the dispute.
“Labor has held up fairly OK, but we’ re definitely decelerating from an economic standpoint, so corporate earnings may reflect that negatively ,” Roth said .“The biggest drivers of t he market are going to be who controls policy in Washington and what the specifics are around t he Chinese trade situation .”
Envoys f rom Washing ton and Beijing are scheduled to meet later this week in their latest bid to put an end to t he dispute that is stunting global economic growth and spooking the stock market.
Broadcom led t he slide in technology stocks Monday, dropping 1.9 percent.
Beverage companies fell amid a sell- of f in consumer product makers. Constellation Brands slid 2.6 percent and Pepsi co fell 1.4 percent. Coca- Cola lost 1.2 percent.
Several big drug makers helped pull healthcare sector stocks lower. Abbott Laboratories gave up 1.2 percent and Merck & Co. slid 0.7 percent.
Financial sector stocks also declined, giving up early gains. Progressive dropped 1.5 percent.
Discovery led the gains in the communication services sector. The stock rose 1.4 percent.
Fox inched up 0.1 percent after the company settled a dispute with Dish Net work over carriage of Fox’ s local TV stations and cable sports networks. Dish pulled the broadcast network from 17 markets in September. Shares in Dish gained 0.2 percent.
Conocophillips climbed
2.1 percent after the energy company raised its quarterly dividend by 38 percent and will buy back $ 3 billion of its stock in 2020.