| Economic Reports and Fed Weigh On Stocks |
| Feb-21-2013 |
| Keywords: stocks, lower, economic reports, existing home sales, fed index leading economic indicators, philly fed report |
Stocks the casualties in a battle between the bulls and bears on Wall Street Thursday.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average finished the session down 47-points. The Nasdaq Composite fell 32-points. The S&P 500 lost 10-points, and is on track to log its first weekly decline of the year.
Investors today reacted to mixed news on the economy, while still trying to gauge possible adjustments the Federal Reserve's $85 billion a month bond buying program.
The National Association of Realtors on Thursday reported existing home sales rose 0.4% in January from December to a 4.92-million unit annualized rate, slightly beating estimates of 4.9 million.
The Labor Department said consumer prices in January remained flat for a second straight month. That surprising the market which had expected an uptick in gasoline prices to lift consumer prices by 0.1% last month. Excluding the food and energy components, prices rose a steeper than expected 0.3%, representing the sharpest monthly increase since May 2011.
The Labor Department reported that weekly jobless claims last week jumped a slightly steeper than expected 20,000, totaling 362,000.
And news on manufacturing did not bode well for stock prices either. The Philadelphia Federal Reserve's gauge of manufacturing activity in the mid-Atlantic region fell to -12.5 in February. The market was looking for a slight expansion in the region's manufacturing, looking for a reading of 1.0.
In corporate news, Wal-Mart posted quarterly profits of $1.67 a share, beating estimates by 10 cents. However, the world's biggest retailer's revenues of $127.1 billion missed expectations of $128.8 billion. Wal-Mart finished the session 1.5% higher.
Hewlett-Packard also a standout performer on the blue chip index. The shares of HP rose 2.4% in regular trading. Hewlett-Packard able to build on those gains in after hours trading. HP late today posted better than expected quarterly earnings of 82 cents a share on revenue of $28.4 billion.
Continued dollar strength and demand concerns sparked another bill selloff in the crude oil market. The April crude oil contract fell 2.5% or $2.38, to close at the lowest level of the year, settling at $92.84 a barrel. |
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Posted by Lou Dobbs Staff at 2:00 PM Email to a friend |
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