[ad_1]
By April Joyner
NEW YORK (Reuters) – The main Wall Street indexes fell on Thursday, on the eve of critical trade talks between the United States and China, although they significantly reduced their losses after US President Donald Trump said that it was possible to reach an agreement this week.
US stocks had fallen more than 1% earlier in the session but had recovered much of the loss after Trump said he received a "beautiful letter" from Chinese President Xi Jinping. The negotiators will meet at 5 pm EDT (9:00 pm GMT) Thursday, said Trump. They are ready to continue discussions until Friday.
Nevertheless, the United States did not give up the tariff increase on Chinese products worth $ 200 billion to 25% Friday. Trump also said that paperwork had been initiated to levy 25% tariffs on Chinese goods with an additional value of $ 325 billion.
Even with the possibility of other tariffs coming into effect, some investors remained optimistic about the possibility of concluding a trade agreement. This has probably helped to control the declines on Thursday, said John Stoltzfus, chief investment strategist at Oppenheimer Asset Management.
"We can very well see the rates set up tomorrow, but that will be solved," said Stoltzfus. "It is too impractical for one or the other party to prolong this in a prolonged trade war."
The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 138.97 points, or 0.54%, to 25,828.36, the S & P 500 lost 8.7 points, or 0.30%, to 2,870.72 and the Nasdaq Composite lost 32.73 points, or 0.41%, to 7,910.59.
The S & P 500 index briefly fell below its 50-day moving average, a momentum indicator observed closely during the session, but finished above that level.
The materials and technology sectors posted the largest declines in the S & P 500 sectors, with declines of 0.8% and 0.7% respectively.
Shares of chip makers, which derive much of China's revenue, continued to fall, with the Philadelphia semiconductor index ending down 1.2%. The index has fallen 6% since the beginning of the week and is poised to record its biggest weekly percentage loss since December.
Chipmaker's shares were also influenced by a disappointing earnings growth forecast from Intel Corp. Intel's shares fell by 5.3% and were the biggest drag for the S & P 500.
Trade-sensitive industry indicators were also affected, with a 1% drop in Boeing Co shares and 1.9% in 3M Co. shares.
The CBOE volatility index, an indicator of investor anxiety, rose for the fourth consecutive session and reached its highest level in more than three months.
Shares of Tapestry Inc. climbed 8.5%, the highest rate for S & P companies, after Coach purse maker beat quarterly earnings expectations and announced a share buyback plan $ 1 billion.
Shares of Chevron Corp rose 3.1%, bringing the biggest boost to the Dow and S & P 500, after the oil company announced that it would not increase its bid purchase of $ 33 billion to buy Anadarko Petroleum Corp.
Falling issues outnumbered NYSE rising issues by a ratio of 1.55: 1; on the Nasdaq, a ratio of 1.48 to 1 favored the decline.
The S & P 500 recorded two new highs in 52 weeks and 11 new lows; the Nasdaq Composite recorded 37 new highs and 98 new lows.
US trade volume was 7.75 billion shares, compared to the average of 6.83 billion shares for the full trading session of the last 20 trading days.
(Report by April Joyner, additional report by Shreyashi Sanyal and Amy Caren Daniel in Bengaluru, edited by Anil D & # 39; Silva, Susan Thomas and Jonathan Oatis)
[ad_2]
Source link