By Yasin Ebrahim
Investing.com – The S&P 500 eased from a fresh intraday record Tuesday, as a retreat in tech offset gains in industrials and a rebound in the airline stocks followed a rout a day earlier.
The S&P 500 fell 0.1%, the Dow Jones Industrial Average gained 0.3%, or 99 points, the Nasdaq slipped 0.4%.
Airline stocks including Southwest Airlines (NYSE:LUV), United Airlines (NASDAQ:UAL) and Delta Air Lines (NYSE:DAL) rebounded from weakness a day earlier, when reports that Covid-related issues including a labor shortages had forced airlines to cancel thousands of flights during the Christmas weekend.
Delta Air Lines gained even as the airline said it expects to cancel more than 250 of 4,133 scheduled mainline and Delta connection flights on Tuesday.
Boeing (NYSE:BA) was also in ascendency up about 1% after Indonesia lifted its ban on the 737 MAX. The MAX was grounded following the crash of one of the jets operated by domestic carrier Lion Air.
Defensive sectors such as utilities were also among the biggest gainers.
The broader market’s retreat from record highs coincided with sluggish price action in big tech following several days of gains.
Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT), Google-parent Alphabet (NASDAQ:GOOGL), and Apple (NASDAQ:AAPL), were in the red, while Meta, formerly known as Facebook (NASDAQ:FB), and Amazon (NASDAQ:AMZN) were marginally higher.
Tech was also weighed down by a fall in chip stocks, paced by a decline in Nvidia (NASDAQ:NVDA), Marvell Technology (NASDAQ:MRVL) and Micron Technology (NASDAQ:MU).
Tesla (NASDAQ:TSLA), meanwhile, gave up the bulk of its intraday gains despite a positive commentary from Wall Street.
“Musk & Co. have navigated the chip supply shortages better than any automaker globally over the last six months, which is why Tesla is in a clear position of strength heading into 2022 with an inflection point year ahead,” Wedbush said in a note.
On the economic front, U.S. home price growth slowed for third straight month.
In other news, Cryptocurrency-related stocks including Riot Blockchain (NASDAQ:NASDAQ:RIOT), Marathon Digital (NASDAQ:MARA), Coinbase (NASDAQ:COIN) Global, were on the backfoot after bitcoin fell below $50,000.