:-: Stocks fall after disappointing consumer confidence report as Dow loses almost 400 points :-:
Strong holiday sales and oil prices helped boost the stock market following a rout two days earlier.Wochit
Stocks dropped in morning trading on Thursday, chipping away at gains made the previous day when the Dow Jones industrial average surged more than 1,000 points.
A gauge of consumer confidence declined sharply in December, missing expectations and weighing on stocks.
The Dow lost 396 points, or 1.73 percent, to 22,482 in morning Thursday trading. The Standard & Poor’s 500 declined 46 points, or 1.88 percent, to 2,421.
The Nasdaq lost 121 points, or 1.85 percent, to 6,433, putting it in a bear market, or at least 20 percent from its most recent closing high of 8,109.69 on Aug. 29. The tech-heavy index fell into a bear market on Friday, but recovered on Wednesday.
The Russell 2000 – an index of small-company stocks that remains in a bear market – slipped 22 points, or 1.66 percent, to 1,308 in morning trading.
The Conference Board said Wednesday that its widely watched index of consumer confidence dropped to a reading of 128.1 in December from 135.7 in November. That marked the least optimistic level since July.
“It’s hard to perceive that the markets would go up after yesterday,” said Ron Weiner, managing partner and director of RDM Finacial Group at HighTower. “There are still enough concerns out there, so I wouldn’t be surprised – and it could be healthy – if we gave back 1 percent to 2 percent max.”
On Wednesday, all four of the indexes jumped nearly 5 percent or more, boosted by a rally in energy stocks and by reports of strong retail sales during the holidays.
Earlier worries that President Trump could remove the Federal Reserve chairman, Jerome Powell, also eased after a White House adviser said the chairman was “100 percent” safe.
That stock surge followed a Christmas Eve Day rout when investors worried about cluster of political problems, from Powell to the partial government shutdown and the Treasury secretary’s bungled attempts to reassure markets.
“Basically we see the U.S. economy as not heading into a recession,” Weiner said. “The rest is difficult but it’s just noise.”
Markets dive on Christmas Eve, getting closer to bear territory for more indices. USA TODAY
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