Stocks end lower amid choppy trading

Technology, big retail losses in August drag year deeper in red

A choppy day of trading ended Wednesday with a broad slide for stocks as Wall Street closed the books on a rocky August that started off strong, but wound up leaving the market deeper in the red for the year.

The S&P 500 fell 0.8 percent, extending its losing streak to a fourth day. The benchmark index ended the month with a 4.2 percent loss after surging 9.1 percent in July.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 0.9 percent, while the Nasdaq composite slid

0.6 percent. The major stock indexes are on pace for weekly losses.

Technology stocks and big retailers were among the heaviest weights on the market. Only communications stocks eked out a slight gain. Smaller company stocks also fell, pulling the Russell 2000 index 0.6 percent lower.

The latest pullback for stocks came as Treasury yields rose broadly. The yield on the 10-year Treasury, which influences interest rates on mortgages and other consumer loans, rose to 3.17 percent from 3.11 percent late Tuesday.

Bond yields have been rising along with expectations for higher interest rates, which the Federal Reserve has been increasing in a bid to squash the highest inflation in decades.

“You have the bond market now taking the Fed seriously,” said Willie Delwiche, investment strategist at All Star Charts. “And it’s not that stocks can’t overcome that, but so far they haven’t overcome that.”

The last time stocks mounted a big rally was in July and early August, when bond yields came off their highs as expectations for higher rates eased.

“If the underlying trend in stocks is lower, then higher bond yields weigh on that,” Delwiche said.

The S&P 500 fell 31.16 points to 3,955. The index is down 17 percent this year.

The Nasdaq lost 66.93 points to 11,816.20, while the Dow gave up 280.44 points to close at 31,510.43. The Russell fell 11.48 points to 1,844.12.

Wall Street is worried that the Fed could hit the brakes too hard on a slowing economy and veer it into a recession. Higher interest rates also hurt investment prices.

Traders are trying to get a better sense of how far and how quickly the Fed’s rate hikes will go, beginning with the central bank’s upcoming interest rate policy meeting Sept. 20 and 21. The Fed has raised interest rates four times this year and is expected to raise short-term rates by another 0.75 percentage points at its September meeting, according to CME Group.