Phone stocks retreated for a fifth straight day
U.S. stock indexes declined on Friday, 09 August 2013 with the Dow Jones Industrial Average halting its longest weekly winning streak since August of last year. Shortly after opening in the red, the benchmark index briefly turned positive, butit was unable to make a sustained move.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average dropped 72.81 points, or 0.5% to 15,425.51. The Nasdaq Composite shed 9.02 points, or 0.3%, to 3,660.11. The S&P 500 fell 0.4% to 1,691.42.
Nine of ten sectors ended in the red while materials outperformed with a gain after China's industrial production report surpassed estimates (9.7% actual, 9.0% forecast). Steelmakers and miners rallied broadly.
There was more encouraging data from China on Friday, with industrial output rising 9.7% in July from a year ago, exceeding expectations. Chinese data is important, because the nation is a major consumer of commodities including metals.
Data on Thursday showed that China's overall exports rose 5.1% year-on-year in July after a small fall in June and were well above expectations for a 3% rise. Imports jumped 10.9% year-on-year.
At Wall Street on friday, economic data was limited to wholesale inventories, which fell 0.2% in June after declining a downwardly revised 0.6% (from -0.5%) in May. That was the third consecutive monthly decline and the fourth monthly drop so far in 2013. The expected wholesale inventories to increase 0.4%.
The Bureau of Economic Analysis assumed that wholesale inventories were flat in June in the advance estimate for second quarter GDP growth. The downward surprise will add a minor negative contribution to the revisions in the second estimate.
Among major shares under focus, shares of BlackBerry jumped 5.7% following a media report that the smartphone maker is open to going private. Priceline.com shares jumped 3.9% a day after the online-travel business reported a 24% rise in second-quarter earnings, with sales growth driven by its hotel and rental-car businesses.
Gap dropped 3.1% after saying July sales at stores open at least a year rose less than analysts estimated. J.C. Penney Co. fell 5.8%.
Phone stocks retreated for a fifth straight day, losing 1% to extend a weekly loss to 2.5 percent. AT&T Inc. slid 1.4% to $34.80.
U.S. crude-oil futures extended a rebound on Friday, 09 August 2013 in the wake of a pickup in Chinese industrial production and a rise in the nternational Energy Agency's global demand forecast, allowing crude futures to trim a weekly loss as they snapped a five-day losing streak.
Crude oil for September delivery rose $2.57, or 2.5%, to close at $105.97 a barrel in Nymex floor trade. Prices rose for first time in six sessions. That left the contract with a 0.9% weekly fall. Bullion metals ended higher on Friday, 09 August 2013. Gold futures rose for a third consecutive session on Friday following upbeat economic data from China.
Gold for December delivery rose $2.30 (0.2%) to end at $1,312.20 an ounce on the New York Mercantile Exchange. For the week, the contract rose $1.70 from last Friday's closing level of $1,310.50. On Friday, September silver gained 22 cents (1%) to end at $20.41 an ounce.
Decliners ran slightly ahead of advancers on the New York Stock Exchange, where nearly 634 million shares traded. Composite volume surpassed 2.9 billion.
On Monday, the July Treasury budget will be released at 14:00 ET.
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