Stocks fall, giving up past week’s gains

Another choppy day of trading amid mixed economic reports

Wall Street capped an upand-down week of trading Friday with a broad sell-off that wiped out the major indexes’ gains for the week.

The S&P 500 lost 0.9 percent and posted its second straight weekly loss. Roughly 80 percent of the stocks in the benchmark index fell. Technology and communication companies accounted for much of the pullback. Industrial and financial stocks also were big drags on the index. Only the index’s health care sector managed a gain.

Small-company stocks bucked the overall market slide. Bond yields rose broadly. Energy prices fell.

Trading has been choppy throughout the week as investors weighed a mixed bag of economic data reflecting how the economy is weathering a spike in COVID-19 cases and how it might continue its recovery in the coming months. Wall Street is also looking ahead to Wednesday, when the Federal Reserve is due to deliver an economic and interest rate policy update.

“We’ve seen a gradual deterioration over the course of the week, with two little up periods, but for the most part, generally a weakening (stock) market,” said Alan Mcknight, chief investment officer at Regions Asset Management.

The S&P 500 fell 40.76 points to 4,432.99. Despite being down about 0.6 percent for the week, the index is within 2.3 percent of the all-time high it set Sept. 2.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 166.44 points, or 0.5 percent, to 34,584.88, while the tech-heavy Nasdaq composite slid 137.96 points, or 0.9 percent, to 15,043.97.

The Russell 2000 index of smaller companies recovered from an early slide and rose 3.96 points, or 0.2 percent, to 2,236.87.

Bond yields rose. The yield on the 10-year Treasury rose to 1.38 percent from 1.33 percent late Thursday.

Technology and communication stocks were the biggest weights on the market. Apple fell 1.8 percent and

Facebook dipped 2.2 percent.

Oil prices fell 0.9 percent and natural gas prices fell

4.3 percent. The weak energy prices helped pull down energy stocks. Oilfield services company Schlumberger fell 1.9 percent.

Health care stocks eked out gains. Lab equipment maker Thermo Fisher Scientific was a standout with a 6.5 percent jump after giving investors an encouraging business update.

Also influencing the market’s gyrations was “quadruple witching,” the simultaneous expiration of four kinds of options and futures contracts.