NEW YORK: Wall Street stocks slipped on Tuesday, led by a decline in healthcare stocks after a tweet from US President Donald Trump on the need to lower drug prices, while expectations the Federal Reserve will raise interest rates supported the US dollar.
Shares of large US pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies sold off after President Donald Trump said he was working on a "new system" to reduce prices in the industry. Shares of Pfizer Inc and Merck & Co shed 1.1 percent, and Amgen Inc dropped 1.4 percent.
The US dollar edged up 0.09 percent against a basket of six major trading currencies and gained 0.11 percent against the Japanese yen ahead of the Fed's meeting next week.
The monthly US jobs report, due on Friday, is expected to show an increase of 186,000 jobs, probably enough to push the Fed to raise its base rate again for the second time in three months.
US Treasury yields rose on Tuesday, supporting the US dollar, as data showed the US trade deficit grew in January to its widest monthly level in nearly five years.
The benchmark 10-year Treasury yield was up nearly 2 basis points at 2.511 percent, while two-year yield edged up 1 basis point at 1.322 percent.
The market is taking in stride, unlike past years, expectations the Fed will raise rates, said Rahul Shah, chief executive of Ideal Asset Management in New York.
"As long as we keep getting macroeconomic data that's supportive of a rate hike we're going to continue to see stocks rally," Shah said. "If financials continue to rally with higher rates and industrials rally with better economic data, that could be enough to power the market higher," he said.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 2.73 points, or 0.01 percent, to 20,951.61. The S&P 500 lost 3.04 points, or 0.13 percent, to 2,372.27 and the Nasdaq Composite added 1.76 points, or 0.03 percent, to 5,850.93.
The S&P 500 healthcare index dropped 0.65 percent, setting it up for its worst day in more than five weeks.
Stocks in Europe traded slightly lower as weak corporate earnings and the biggest fall in German industrial orders since the depths of the global financial crisis weighed on sentiment.
Europe's FTSEurofirst index of the 300 leading regional shares fell as much as 0.31 percent, pulled down by healthcare and financial stocks.
MSCI's all-country world stock index fell 0.21 percent.
Brent crude added 17 cents at $56.18 a barrel while US West Texas Intermediate (WTI) crude rose 19 cents at $53.39. Both benchmarks had traded in negative and positive territory since the start of the day's Asian session.
US Treasury yields rose with the 30-year yield at its highest in more than a month as investors made room for this week's supply of coupon-bearing government debt led by $24 billion worth of three-year notes.
Investors also reduced their bond holdings in anticipation of a rate increase from the Fed's policy meeting next week.
Benchmark 10-year Treasury notes fell 6/32 in price to yield 2.5142 percent, while the 30-year yield was up nearly 2 basis point at 3.116 percent after touching its highest level since Feb. 3, Reuters data showed.
Gold slipped 0.64 percent to $1,217.70 an ounce.
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