 "A Wall Street sign is pictured in the rain outside the New York Stock Exchange in New York.")
US stock indexes ended little changed in light trading on Friday, with consumer stocks falling as investors fretted over early reports on the US holiday shopping season and Disney's subscriber losses weighed on the market.
US stock markets closed three hours earlier following the Thanksgiving holiday on Thursday, with many traders taking the day off.
Trading volume was modest, with 2.79 billion shares changing hands on US exchanges, compared with the 7 billion average for the previous seven sessions.
"We're going to get today over with and hit the ground running next week," said Brian Battle, director of trading at Performance Trust Capital Partners in Chicago.
Battle expects a busy start to next week as investors prepare for a December 4 non-farm payrolls report that may bring volatility ahead of a widely expected decision by the US Federal Reserve to raise interest rates at its mid-December meeting.
The Dow Jones industrial average fell 14.9 points, or 0.08%, to 17,798.49, the S&P 500 gained 1.24 points, or 0.06%, to 2,090.11 and the Nasdaq Composite added 11.38 points, or 0.22%, to 5,127.53.
Seven out of 10 major S&P sectors rose slightly. The energy index fell 0.7% as oil prices fell. Media and retailer stocks led the consumer discretionary sector's 0.4% decline.
Crowds were thin at US stores and shopping malls in the early hours of Black Friday and on Thanksgiving evening as shoppers responded to early holiday discounts with caution and as bad weather hurt the turnout.
The top retail percentage decliner was Urban Outfitters
Big retailers Walmart
Thanksgiving kicks off the crucial November and December shopping season, during which retailers make between 20% and 40% of annual sales.
"We believe Thanksgiving shopping was a bust," analysts at Suntrust Robinson Humphrey said in a research note. "Members of our team who went to the malls first had no problem finding parking or navigating stores."
Performance Trust's Battle, however, called Black Friday anecdotes "noise."
"What matters most is the season as a whole and not just one day when some of that business is being done online," he said.
Walt Disney
Advancing issues outnumbered declining ones on the NYSE by 1,829 to 1,154, for a 1.58-to-1 ratio on the upside; on the Nasdaq, 1,698 issues rose and 983 fell for a 1.73-to-1 ratio favoring advancers.
The S&P 500 posted 16 new 52-week highs and 3 new lows; the Nasdaq recorded 82 new highs and 33 new lows.
