NEW YORK REPORT
US stocks fell yesterday as a surprise drop in a gauge of consumer confidence overshadowed signs of stabilisation in housing and solid earnings from Walgreen.
Stocks started higher but then turned lower as the Conference Board’s Consumer Confidence Index for September fell.
Even so, investors were reluctant to sell stocks indiscriminately. Major indexes spent most of the session shuttling between small losses and break-even. The Dow Jones industrial average dropped 47.16 points, or 0.48 per cent, to 9,742.20. The Standard & Poor’s 500 Index shed 2.37 points, or 0.22 per cent, to 1,060.61. The Nasdaq Composite Index dipped 6.70 points, or 0.31 per cent, to 2,124.04.
Top drags included manufacturer 3M, off 1.4 per cent to $73.94 and network equipment maker Cisco Systems, down 1.3 per cent at $23.30. Apple declined 0.4 per cent to $185.38.
But shares of Walgreen jumped 9.2 per cent to $37.35 after the largest US drugstore chain reported a quarterly profit that topped expectations.
The S&P 500, up 15.4 per cent so far this quarter, is making a run for its best quarterly performance since the fourth quarter of 1998. The benchmark index has rallied nearly 60 per cent from the 12-year low of early March.