Investing.com – U.S. stocks moved lower on Friday as a negative reaction to earnings reports took the wind out of investor sentiment while traders prepared for next week’s meeting of the Federal Reserve (Fed).
At 14:50GMT, or 12:50ET, the Dow Jones fell 66 points, or 0.37%, while the S&P 500 lost 9 points, or 0.44%, and the tech-heavy NASDAQ Composite traded down 71 points, or 1.43%.
In earnings, Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT), Visa and General Electric (NYSE:GE) lead the decliners in the Dow Jones after reporting earnings.
The blue-chip computer maker tumbled more than 8% after hit by higher traffic costs and a stronger dollar.
The credit card company fell 4% after cutting its revenue forecast.
And GE fell more than 1% after missing consensus on revenue.
In other negative reports, Google’s parent Alphabet Inc (NASDAQ:GOOGL) sunk more than 6% as results reported after Thursday’s close were hit by higher traffic costs and a stronger dollar.
Starbucks (NASDAQ:SBUX) also fell close to 6% as sales growth fell short of expectations.
Caterpillar Inc (NYSE:CAT) also traded down more than 1% after missing by a penny on EPS and cutting its annual sales and profit forecast.
Attempting to buck the general trend, McDonald’s Corporation (NYSE:MCD) traded flat after beating on both earnings and revenue.
Meanwhile, attention began to shift to next week’s Federal Reserve (Fed) monetary policy decision which will be announced on April 27.
The Fed was widely expected to leave rates untouched with not a single one of the 80 analysts surveyed in a recent Reuters’ poll counting on a hike at the meeting.
For the meeting itself, markets were waiting to see if the U.S. central bank would take on a more hawkish tone, especially considering that 50 of the experts in the poll expected the increase in interest rates to occur at the June meeting.
The Federal funds rate was pricing interest rates to be at 0.75-1.00 at the end of the year, implying at least two hikes this year, in line with the Fed officials’ own median forecast.
The U.S. dollar index, which measures the greenback’s strength against a trade-weighted basket of six major currencies, rose 0.27% at 94.88, at 14:55GMT, or 12:55ET.
On a light economic calendar, Markit’s manufacturing PMI for April unexpectedly declined, marking the weakest upturn in six-and-a-half years.
“With prior months’ survey data pointing to annualized GDP growth of just 0.7% in the first quarter, the deteriorating performance of manufacturing suggests that growth could weaken closer towards stagnation in the second quarter,” Markit chief economist Chris Williamson warned.
Additionally, crude shot up on Friday and was on track to be not only its third consecutive week of gains, but also one of its biggest weekly rallies this year.
Investors waited for the U.S. rig count data from Baker Hughes which will be released later on Friday.
In this context, U.S. crude futures gained 2.22% to $44.14 a barrel by 15:00GMT, or 11:00AM ET, while Brent oil traded up 2.36% to $45.58.