Investing.com -- U.S. stocks closed broadly lower closing a strong month on a down note, as a bevy of retail stocks took a hit on Cyber Monday.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average and the NASDAQ Composite index both fell slightly on Monday amid sell-offs in the health care and aforementioned retail sectors. The Dow lost 78.50 or 0.44% to close at 17,719.92, while the NASDAQ dropped by 18.86 or 0.37% ending Monday's session at 5,108.67. The S&P 500 Composite index, meanwhile, fell 9.70 or 0.46% to 2,080.41, as five of 10 sectors closed in the red. Stocks in the Health Care, Consumer Goods and Consumer Services sectors lagged, each falling by more than 0.85% on the session. Stocks in the Energy and Basic Materials industries led. Despite Monday's losses, all three of the major indices closed higher for the second straight month – representing the first time the U.S. equities markets posted consecutive monthly gains since the spring.
A host of prominent retailers, including Wal-Mart Stores Inc (N:WMT), Macy`s Inc (N:M) and JC Penney Company Inc Holding (N:JCP), fell sharply on the session on Cyber Monday, on a day widely considered the largest online shopping day of the year. Online sales for the day were on pace to eclipse $3 billion for the first time on record, according to a study from Adobe (O:ADBE). It follows online sales of approximately $4.5 billion on Thanksgiving and Black Friday, Adobe found. The strong online turnout offsets thin customer volume at malls across the U.S., which has pulled down stocks in the retail industry.
The top performer on the Dow was Caterpillar Inc (N:CAT), which gained 1.20 or 1.68% to close at 72.42. Shares in the world's largest manufacturer of construction equipment are still down more than 30% over the last 12 months, amid a prolonged slump in global commodities. Wal-Mart (N:WMT) was the worst performer, losing 1.04 or 1.74% to close at 58.85.
The biggest gainer on the NASDAQ was Chinese web service company Baidu Inc (O:BIDU), which surged 12.39 or 6.03% to 217.97. On Monday, the International Monetary Fund approved reserve-currency status for the yuan by adding the Renminbi to its Special Drawing Rights basket of currencies. The worst performer was Regeneron Pharmaceuticals Inc (O:REGN), which fell 18.60 or 3.30% to 544.50, as investors locked into profits from the pharmaceutical giant. Regeneron, which develops platforms designed to identify proteins of therapeutic interest to help treat serious medical conditions, had been up nearly 5% over the previous three months before Monday's sell-off.
The top performer on the S&P 500 was NRG Energy Inc (N:NRG), which gained 0.74 or 6.37% to 12.36. Earlier on Monday, analysts from Guggenheim Securities upgraded 23 oil stocks while forecasting that crude will reach $100 a barrel by 2018. The worst performer was Computer Sciences Corporation (N:CSC), which fell nearly 55% on the session to 31.33, after the Northern Virginia-based information technology services company completed a spin-off of its U.S. government unit on Monday.
On the New York Stock Exchange, declining issues outnumbered advancing ones by a 1,729 to 1,347 margin.