Wall Street down after mediocre results of major banks By Reuters

By Amy Caren Daniel

(Reuters) – US stocks fell on Monday, hurt by financial equity losses, profits from major Wall Street banks, Goldman Sachs and Citigroup failed to impress.

Goldman Sachs Group Inc. (NYSE 🙂 fell 2.6%, while Citigroup Inc. (NYSE 🙂 lost 1%. Both banks exceeded quarterly earnings estimates, but their revenue was missed.

The financial sector fell by 0.48% and the S & P Banks index by 0.66%.

"People are sort of looking for direction," said Scott Brown, chief economist at Raymond James in St. Petersburg, Florida.

"We have a lot of reports about the profits that are coming in, including the banks, and they are important because they should tell us something about the state of the economy."

Monday's results follow JPMorgan (NYSE 🙂 Chase's upbeat results Friday eased fears of a season of first-quarter results curbing Wall Street's big recovery following the fall of the year latest.

The benchmark is now less than 1% of its September closing record.

In the health care sector, the health care sector advanced 0.2%, rebounding after a difficult week, thanks to a gain of more than 1% in CVS Health Corp.'s UnitedHealth Group Inc. (NYSE 🙂 NYSE 🙂 and Anthem (NYSE 🙂 Inc.

On the trade front, Reuters reported that US negotiators had tempered the demands for China to limit subsidies to the industry as a precondition for entering into an agreement, while Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin, had hoped that the negotiations would approach a final round.

At 10:01 am French time, the drop of 38.21 points, or 0.14%, to 26,374.09. The S & P 500 was down 3.06 points, or 0.11%, to 2,904.35 and the drop of 9.48 points, or 0.12%, to 7,974.68.

According to Refinitiv data, 79.3% of the 29 companies in the S & P 500 that have reported earnings so far have exceeded earnings expectations in the first quarter, above the average of the last four quarters.

Analysts expect the S & P 500 companies to record a 2.3% year-over-year decline in profits, their first annual contraction since 2016.

Among other titles, Waste Management Inc. (NYSE 🙂 rose 2.2% after the company announced that it would buy a smaller rival, Advanced Disposal Services Inc., for about $ 3 billion.

Boeing (NYSE 🙂 Co dropped 0.7% after US President Donald Trump urged the planner in a tweet to repair and "rename" his troubled airliner. Brand Finance consulting firm said that a negative publicity about the grounding of its 737 MAX jet would erase $ 12 billion worth of the brand's value.

Nike Inc. (NYSE 🙂 rose 0.7% after Tiger Woods, the brand's longtime ambassador, won the Masters title, ending an 11-year drought.

Falling issues outnumbered defenders for a ratio of 1.08 to 1 on the NYSE and a ratio of 1.22 to 1 on the Nasdaq.

The S & P index recorded 48 new highs over 52 weeks and a new low, while the Nasdaq recorded 56 new highs and 19 new lows.