US open: Stocks edge mostly lower amid disappointing earnings and poor house data
US stocks edged mostly lower early Friday, as investors digested a series of uninspiring earnings reports and tepid house data.
Amazon.Com Inc.
$180.00
07:45 26/04/24
American Express Co.
$236.38
07:44 26/04/24
ANTHEM
$142.05
22:15 04/09/15
Apple Inc.
$170.07
07:45 26/04/24
Caterpillar Inc.
$343.94
07:45 26/04/24
CIGNA Corp.
$354.00
07:45 26/04/24
Dow Jones I.A.
38,287.15
04:30 15/10/20
Nasdaq 100
17,734.67
07:45 26/04/24
S&P 500
5,108.41
18:54 26/04/24
Starbucks Corp.
$88.93
07:45 26/04/24
Just after 1500 BST, the Dow Jones Industrial Average was off by nine points at 17,722.60, while the S&P 500 fell two points and the Nasdaq was 10 points higher.
Amazon surges
On Thursday, the Dow Jones turned negative for the year in the wake of disappointing earnings from Caterpillar and American Express, which joined IBM and Apple in the list of companies whose results were met by a lukewarm reception.
“The strong dollar has been mentioned a lot in the earnings statements of the big US corporates,” said CMC Markets’ analyst Jasper Lawler.
“But there are also clearly some issues over domestic demand looking at the poor retail sales numbers as well as demand overseas from China with its manufacturing sector seen slumping again in July.”
In company news, Amazon surged 16.6% after the e-commerce giant reported an unexpected profit and a sharp hike in sales for the second quarter late on Thursday.
Starbucks rose 3.34% after the coffee retailer reported an 18% jump in quarterly revenue, exceeding analysts’ expectations.
On Friday, the earnings season slows down slightly with Biogen, American Airlines and State Street among those reporting.
Health benefit group Anthem declined 3.02% after announcing it had agreed an agreement to purchase sector peer Cigna in a $54.2bn cash and stock deal.
Friday data
Sales of new single-family homes in the US dropped 6.8% in June to an annual rate of 482,000, the slowest pace in seven months, according to figures released by the Commerce Department.
Meanwhile, activity at US factories picked up slightly in July according to Markit’s purchasing managers’ index, which rose to a reading of 53.8 points from a 20-month low of 53.6 in June.
Elsewhere, Asian markets fell, following Wall Street’s lead overnight, with losses across the region at the close of week's trading, while European stocks were broadly flat.
The dollar was broadly flat against the yen, but rose 0.16% and 0.39% against the pound and the euro respectively, while gold futures slumped 1.26% to $1,080.30.
Oil prices were mixed, with West Texas Intermediate climbing 0.14% to $48.52 a barrel, while Brent shed 0.66% to $54.91 a barrel.