By Sinéad Carew and Ragini Mathur
Oct 12 (Reuters) - The Nasdaq composite closed lower on Monday as oil prices jumped nearly $2 a barrel after attacks on a Saudi airport, and investors waited for banks
to kick off the third-quarter earnings season and for economic data this week.
The S&P 500 closed nearly flat while the Dow was higher.
Oil futures rallied after deadly strikes on Riyadh's international airport over the weekend. The attacks overshadowed the prospect of increased supplies after US President Donald Trump hailed fresh Russian diesel exports and talked about a Russia-Ukraine ceasefire on energy targets.
In coming days, US investors will focus on corporate earnings, with major US banks including Goldman Sachs, Citigroup and JPMorgan Chase reporting early on Tuesday. Analysts were expecting S&P 500 earnings to surge 30.6% in the third quarter, according to LSEG IBES data.
Also due out this week are September readings for US consumer and producer inflation data as well as retail sales data. While the US Treasury market was closed on Monday for Columbus Day, stock investors have been wary of bond yields' recent advance to 24-year highs as elevated energy prices have stoked inflation concerns.
"Looking out further in the week, we have some big economic reports," said Tim Ghriskey, senior portfolio strategist at Ingalls & Snyder in New York. He said investors were cautious due to a lack of direction from bonds.
"We're also waiting on earnings and that's significant. The four large banks reporting on Tuesday can have a big impact," he said.
According to preliminary data, the S&P 500 lost 3.75 points, or 0.05%, to end at 7,807.79 points, while the Nasdaq Composite lost 120.17 points, or 0.44%, to 27,246.00. The Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 198.22 points, or 0.38%, to 51,853.17.
"There's a lot to be wary of," said Robert Pavlik, senior portfolio manager at Dakota Wealth in Fairfield, Connecticut, pointing to upcoming data and earnings along with rising oil prices.
"You're walking down a train line and you don't know, because it's dark, if a train is coming and so, you know, you're just being real careful," he said.
With oil prices rising, energy outperformed the S&P 500's major industry sectors during Monday's session. The S&P 500 communication services index also rose with a boost from Meta.
Technology and consumer discretionary were laggards. Technology's weakness was most pronounced among chip stocks with the Philadelphia semiconductor index losing ground and hitting a three-week low.
In consumer discretionary, Chipotle Mexican Grill shares fell after Starbucks said it was not buying the burrito chain.
Microsoft was up 0.9%. Earlier, its market capitalization rose above $4 trillion for the first time in a year after it announced plans for major deployment of its own AI chips.
Salesforce shares rose after BofA Global Research upgraded the stock to "buy" from "underperform." Also eBay rose after Morgan Stanley added the stock to its top-pick list.
Meanwhile, Cleveland Federal Reserve President Beth Hammack said the US central bank should move "relatively quickly" to a more restrictive monetary policy stance to fight inflation, which she feels has become more broad-based and is starting to influence firms' price-setting plans.
Traders were pricing in a less than 22% chance the US Federal Reserve will hike interest rates this month, according to CME's FedWatch tool, up from 17.7% on Friday.
(Reporting by Sinéad Carew in New York, Ragini Mathur and Purvi Agarwal in Bengaluru; Editing by Pooja Desai and David Gregorio)
