Late rally extends record gains
But Apple and United Continental have bad days on Wall Street
A last-minute surge nudged U.S. stock indexes mostly higher Thursday, barely extending the market’s winning streak and milestone-setting run.
The Standard & Poor’s 500 index and Dow Jones industrial average closed higher for the fifth straight day, each posting new highs. The other indexes finished slightly lower as investors continued to pore through the latest batch of company earnings.
Technology companies weighed on the market all day, but gains in health care stocks helped offset some of those losses.
“You have a lot of risk assets, especially equities, having done pretty well,” said Sameer Samana, strategist for Wells Fargo Investment Institute. “Some people are viewing now as a pretty good time to make sure they lock in some of that performance.”
Apple had its worst day in two months amid investor concern that its recently launched iPhone 8 models are lagging in market share compared to prior iPhone models. The stock finished down 2.4 percent at $155.98. Apple is still up 34.7 percent this year.
The slide in Apple and other tech companies weighed on the market for much of the day. The sector, which is leading all other sectors in the S&P 500 with a gain of 30 percent this year, recovered some losses late in the day.
“The sector has had such a great run, but you’re starting to see some concerns about how big they’ve gotten, some chatter in Washington about should there be some regulations,” Samana said. “People are just content to take some money off the table.”
While many more companies will be reporting third-quarter results in coming weeks, so far earnings have been largely positive. Some 75 S&P 500 companies have reported quarterly results, posting sales growth of about 6 percent and earnings gains of about 9 percent, Samana said.
Even so, quarterly report cards from several companies failed to impress investors Thursday.
United Continental sank 12.1 percent to $59.78 after the parent of United Airlines said that weak prices will continue this year. The stock was the biggest decliner in the S&P 500.