Investing.com – U.S. investors seemed determined on Thursday to take some profit before the release of the February monthly jobs report on Friday that was forecast to show the creation of 190,000 non-farm payrolls, though Wall Street’s major indices were still on track to pocket weekly gains of about 1.5% and the S&P remains 8.5% above the February low.
At 16:34GMT or 11:34AM ET, the Dow 30 shed 64 points or 0.07%, while the S&P 500 slipped 7 points or 0.36% and the tech-heavy NASDAQ Composite lost 26 points or 0.55%.
On the economic front, service sector activity in the U.S. grew at the slowest pace in almost two years in February, dampening optimism over the health of the economy and dimming the case for higher interest rates later this year, according to the non-manufacturing PMI from the Institute of Supply Management, while the final reading of services PMI from Markit showed the first contraction since October 2013.
Additionally, the number of people who filed for unemployment assistance in the U.S. last week rose to a four-week high, worse than the consensus forecast. Nevertheless, the U.S. Department of Labor data has been below the 300,000 mark usually associated with a firming labor market for near-on a year. Furthermore, the four-week moving average, considered a more accurate gauge of labor trends because it reduces volatility in the week-to-week data, fell to its lowest level since late November.
In other data points released on Thursday, non-farm productivity fell less sharply in the fourth quarter than originally thought, although unit labor costs rose less than expected.
Meanwhile, factory orders for January rose by a less-than-expected 1.6%. However, the first increase since October fueled hopes that the U.S. has seen the end of the factory slump.
With regard to monetary policy, Dallas Fed chief Robert Kaplan warned on Thursday that the Fed should be patient with further rate hikes.
Kaplan also commented that he did not expect a balancing in the oil market until well in to 2017. In that light, black gold showed choppy trade throughout the session but managed to recover from losses and post gains. Crude oil futures for April delivery on the New York Mercantile Exchange advanced $0.18, or 0.52%, to trade at $34.84 a barrel by 16:39GMT, or 11:39AM ET, while Brent oil rose $0.01 or 0.03% to $36.94.
Among market movers, Costco Wholesale (NASDAQ:COST) dropped 2% after earnings-per-share (EPS) reported after the market close on Thursday missed estimates by $0.04.
Joy Global (NYSE:JOY) surged more than 14% despite reporting a worse –than-expected loss.
Shares in Herbalife (NYSE:HLF) fell by close to 8% as the seller of supplements and weight-loss products announced that it had overstated metrics of “active new members” in three prior quarters.