US stocks extended their losses in late morning trading on Friday after weak GDP and consumer sentiment data added to investor concerns about the strength of the economy.
The latest data showed the economy contracted at a 0.7 percent annual rate in the first quarter, a sharp turnaround from an earlier estimate of a 0.2 percent growth pace issued last month.
Economists had expected GDP would be revised to show a contraction of 0.8 percent. Consumer sentiment fell in May, a survey by the University of Michigan showed, while the Institute for Supply Management-Chicago Business Barometer unexpectedly fell in May.
"The data is telling us that the economy is improving but it is not super strong," said Kim Forrest, a senior equity research analyst at Fort Pitt Capital Group in Pittsburgh. "We are looking at the first half of 2015, which is probably not as strong as investors would have liked. So that adds to today's lackluster market action."
At 11:47 am ET (1547 GMT) the Dow Jones industrial average was down 105.81 points, or 0.58 percent, at 18,020.31, the S&P 500 was down 10.03 points, or 0.47 percent, at 2,110.76 and the Nasdaq Composite was down 22.08 points, or 0.43 percent, at 5,075.89. All 10 major S&P 500 sectors were down, with the industrial sector's 1.15 percent drop being the steepest.
Comments
Comments are closed.