Wall Street’s main indexes fell on Friday after the latest jobs data raised the prospects of a more cautious Federal Reserve, while a survey showed unexpected weakness in U.S. consumer sentiment.
A Labor Department report showed the U.S. economy added 143,000 jobs in January, compared with a rise of 170,000 expected by economists.
The unemployment rate stood at 4%, compared with the expectations of 4.1%, while the U.S. economy created 598,000 fewer jobs in the 12 months through March than previously estimated.
“It’s enough to keep the Fed on the sidelines, but also put just a seed of doubt about the economic strength in the back of investors’ minds,” said Ross Mayfield, investment strategist at Baird.
“I don’t think it’s a negative print, but I don’t think it’s a big risk-on print either.”
Separately, the University of Michigan’s preliminary index on consumer sentiment for February came in at 67.8, compared to a forecast of 71.1.
Traders of short-term interest-rate futures continue to bet the Fed will next cut its policy rate in June after the data.
At 10:06 a.m. ET, the Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 70.38 points, or 0.16%, to 44,677.25, the S&P 500 lost 11.84 points, or 0.19%, to 6,071.73 and the Nasdaq Composite lost 108.18 points, or 0.55%, to 19,683.82.
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Six of the 11 S&P 500 sectors traded lower, with consumer discretionary leading losses with a 1.4% fall.
Meanwhile, Amazon.com dipped 3.6% due to weakness in the retailer’s cloud computing unit, Amazon Web Services, and lower-than-expected forecasts for first-quarter revenue and profit.
Markets had a dismal start to the week when U.S. President Donald Trump announced sweeping trade tariffs over the weekend, but suspended the levies on goods from Mexico and Canada on Monday for a month.
Since then, a host of strong earnings and optimism about a potential China-U.S. trade deal despite Beijing’s tit-for-tat tariffs have set all three major indexes on track for weekly gains, with the Dow on pace for its fourth straight weekly rise.
Of the 292 S&P 500 companies that have reported earnings so far, more than 76% beat analysts’ expectations, according to data compiled by LSEG.
Among other early movers, Pinterest jumped 17.5% after the image-sharing platform forecast first-quarter revenue above market estimates.
Elf Beauty tumbled 23.3% after the cosmetics company cut its annual net sales and profit forecasts, while Expedia added 16.1% after the online travel platform posted better-than-expected fourth-quarter results.
Chipmaker Microchip Technology fell 3.7% after forecasting fourth-quarter net sales and profit below estimates.
Declining issues outnumbered advancers by a 1.39-to-1 ratio on the NYSE and by a 1.6-to-1 ratio on the Nasdaq.
The S&P 500 posted 32 new 52-week highs and 13 new lows while the Nasdaq Composite recorded 73 new highs and 68 new lows.
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