Please try another search
© Reuters. Traders work on the floor of the NYSE in New York
By Caroline Valetkevitch
NEW YORK (Reuters) - U.S. stocks fell on Thursday, led by declines in technology heavyweights, after reports of new coronavirus cases in China and other countries intensified fears over its spread and impact on the global economy.
Investors were unnerved by a sharp late-morning drop that took the S&P 500 briefly down more than 1% on the day, with some traders attributing the move to a Global Times report that a central Beijing hospital had reported 36 new cases. This raised worries about a potential increase in infections in the Chinese capital.
Investors were already skittish after Japan reported two new deaths and South Korea reported a rise in new infections. Research suggested the virus was spreading more quickly than previously thought.
"The overlying question is the uncertainty over the coronavirus and whether it's going to spread further and impact global economic activity before things stabilize and ultimately get better," said Michael Sheldon, executive director and CIO at RDM Financial Group at Hightower in Westport, Connecticut.
He said it appeared investors were taking profits in some high-flying technology names and buying shares of other groups, including small caps. The Russell 2000 index ended up 0.2% on the day.
The S&P 500 technology index lost 1% on the day. The index has led gains in the S&P 500 so far this year and is still up more than 10% since Dec. 31. Shares of Microsoft Corp (NASDAQ:MSFT), Apple Inc (NASDAQ:AAPL) and Amazon.com Inc (NASDAQ:AMZN) fell and were among the biggest drag on the S&P 500 on Thursday.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 128.05 points, or 0.44%, to 29,219.98, the S&P 500 lost 12.92 points, or 0.38%, to 3,373.23 and the Nasdaq Composite dropped 66.22 points, or 0.67%, to 9,750.97.
Recent policy easing by China, a largely better-than-expected fourth-quarter earnings season and hopes that the economic jolt from the coronavirus will be short-lived have pushed Wall Street's main indexes to new highs in recent weeks.
"In my opinion, what is happening is the market got well ahead of itself. The coronavirus thing is not over by any stretch," said Ken Polcari, senior market strategist at SlateStone Wealth LLC in Jupiter, Florida.
E*Trade jumped 21.8% after Morgan Stanley (NYSE:MS) offered to buy it in a $13 billion stock deal, the biggest acquisition by a Wall Street bank since the financial crisis.
In other corporate news, ViacomCBS Inc slumped 17.9% as its earnings fell short of revenue and profit expectations in its first quarterly earnings results since closing its merger.
The S&P 500 posted 45 new 52-week highs and 4 new lows; the Nasdaq Composite recorded 138 new highs and 56 new lows.
Volume on U.S. exchanges was 8.36 billion shares, compared with the 7.63 billion average for the full session over the last 20 trading days.
(Reuters) - Scandinavian airline SAS said on Saturday it entered into an agreement with Apollo Global Management (NYSE:APO) to raise $700 million of fresh financing it needs to...
(Reuters) -Anshu Jain, a top finance executive best known for helping German lender Deutsche Bank AG (NYSE:DB) take on the largest Wall Street firms, died overnight on Saturday...
By Svea Herbst-Bayliss (Reuters) - The New York Times Co has turned to Bank of America Corp (NYSE:BAC) and law firm Sidley Austin LLP for advice on how to handle a potential board...
Are you sure you want to block %USER_NAME%?
By doing so, you and %USER_NAME% will not be able to see any of each other's Investing.com's posts.
%USER_NAME% was successfully added to your Block List
Since you’ve just unblocked this person, you must wait 48 hours before renewing the block.
I feel that this comment is:
Thank You!
Your report has been sent to our moderators for review
Add a Comment
We encourage you to use comments to engage with other users, share your perspective and ask questions of authors and each other. However, in order to maintain the high level of discourse we’ve all come to value and expect, please keep the following criteria in mind:
Enrich the conversation, don’t trash it.
Stay focused and on track. Only post material that’s relevant to the topic being discussed.
Be respectful. Even negative opinions can be framed positively and diplomatically. Avoid profanity, slander or personal attacks directed at an author or another user. Racism, sexism and other forms of discrimination will not be tolerated.
Perpetrators of spam or abuse will be deleted from the site and prohibited from future registration at Investing.com’s discretion.