Investing.com – Wall Street fell on Thursday as energy stocks weighed on markets.
The S&P 500 fell four points or 0.15% to 2,798.37 as of 10:17 AM ET (15:17 GMT) while the Dow composite decreased 67 points or 0.26% to 26,047.76, and tech heavy NASDAQ Composite was down over 15 points or 0.21% to 7,282.70.
Financial stocks were up after bank earning results. Morgan Stanley (NYSE:MS) rose 0.59% after it reported higher than expected earnings in the fourth quarter, while Bank of America (NYSE:BAC) increased 0.60% after its financial results beat estimates. Solar power firm Spi Energy Co Ltd (NASDAQ:SPI) surged 22.64% after it announced it would explore blockchain-based infrastructure while semiconductor Advanced Micro Devices (NASDAQ:AMD) increased 3.45%.
Elsewhere Boeing (NYSE:BA) was down 2.39% while aluminium company Alcoa (NYSE:AA) Corp lost 7.37% after its earnings results came in less than expected and Teva Pharma Industries Ltd ADR (NYSE:TEVA) slipped 4.52%.
Meanwhile the amount people who filed for unemployment assistance in the U.S. last week fell more than expected last week, while home starts recorded its biggest drop in over a year.
Jobless claims fell by 41,000 to a seasonally adjusted 220,000 from 261,000 in the prior week, the Labor Department said.
In a separate report, housing starts decreased 8.2 percent to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 1.192 million units, the Commerce Department said.
In Europe stocks were mostly down. In Germany the DAX rose 41 points or 0.31% while France’s CAC 40 decreased 11 points or 0.21% and in London the FTSE 100 lost 32 points or 0.42%. Meanwhile Spain’s IBEX 35 was down 40 points or 0.39% and the pan-European Euro Stoxx 50 slumped just over half a point or 0.02%.
In commodities, gold futures were down 0.60% to $1,331.10 a troy ounce while crude oil futures fell 0.39% to $63.72 a barrel. The U.S dollar index, which measures the greenback against a basket of six major currencies, slumped 0.43% to 90.26.