Tuesday's early trade: stocks slip ahead of Trump's address to Congress

US stocks dipped Tuesday morning, dragged down by financial and consumer discretionary shares, with investors awaiting President Donald Trump's first speech to a joint session of Congress. Trump's promises of tax reform, infrastructure spending and simpler regulations have sparked a post-election rally that has propelled the main US market indexes to record highs.
"What we're looking for tonight is just more meat on those bones," said Mark Spellman, portfolio manager at Alpine Funds in Purchase, New York. "We've gotten these generalities and we're trying to figure out how things are going to be constructed," he said. The address at 9:00 pm ET (0200 GMT) could touch on tax reforms, defence spending and his plans to overhaul the US healthcare system. But on Wall Street, financial and consumer discretionary stocks dropped, pulling down the major indexes.
Target fell 12.2 percent and was on track for its worst day since December 2008 after the retailer's full-year profit forecast missed estimates and the company said it would take a $1 billion hit to margins. Also weighing on sentiment was data that showed US economic growth slowed in the fourth quarter. At 11:06 am ET the Dow Jones Industrial Average was down 0.37 points, or flat, at 20,837.07, the S&P 500 was down 2.46 points, or 0.10 percent, at 2,367.29 and the Nasdaq Composite was down 17.85 points, or 0.3 percent, at 5,844.05.