By Sinéad Carew and Avinash P
Aug 20 (Reuters) - The main U.S. stock indexes fell on Thursday and hovered near two-week lows, as rising Treasury yields dented risk appetite and disappointing results from retail bellwether Walmart added pressure along with rallying oil prices.
Walmart shares fell 9% after it missed Wall Street expectations for quarterly comparable sales rising gasoline prices had shoppers reining in spending. The report dragged the S&P 500 consumer staples index down 1.5%. Consumer
discretionary fell 1.9%, putting it among the weakest sectors.
Rival retailers also fell after Walmart's earnings, with Albertsons down 1.5% and Costco down 2.3%.
Another negative, said Mona Mahajan, head of investment strategy at Edward Jones, was U.S. crude oil trading above $87, touching its highest level since late July. She also pointed to upward pressure on bond yields as a further weight on stocks.
Wall Street indexes had risen on Wednesday after the U.S. Treasury Department said it would spend more than double the expected amount on buying back bonds in a bid to slow gains in bond yields. On Thursday, however, stocks declined as yields resumed their advance.
U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said he may again increase the volume of Treasury bonds the government will repurchase. Yields on the 30-year and 10-year bonds pared gains briefly after his comments, before resuming their upward path.
"There are a couple of headwinds that the markets woke up to today," said Mahajan. "One was a resumption in the increase in bond yields across the curve that came despite yesterday's Treasury move ... it reversed very quickly, within 24 hours."
And after weaker-than-expected retail sales data for July and mixed labor market reports, investors were already monitoring consumer health, when the Walmart numbers came in weaker than expected.
"There is some question about how resilient the consumer can be with ongoing elevated gas prices and inflationary pressures," Mahajan said.
At 2:12 p.m. the Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 605.14 points, or 1.13%, to 52,857.91, the S&P 500 lost 54.02 points, or 0.70%, to 7,653.96 and the Nasdaq Composite lost 289.62 points, or 1.10%, to 26,040.53.
The S&P 500 consumer discretionary sector was the biggest drag on the benchmark index, dragged by losses in Amazon and Tesla.
The S&P 500 energy index rose 0.6% as oil gained for the fifth consecutive session due to stalled U.S.-Iran peace talks and Middle East supply disruptions.
Separately, data showed the number of Americans filing claims for unemployment benefits slipped last week, suggesting the labor market remained stable.
Meanwhile, cryptocurrency-related companies rallied a day after U.S. President Donald Trump called on Congress to pass a crypto bill. Bitcoin hoarder Strategy added 6.7% and exchange operator Coinbase Global rose 7%.
Biotech company Moderna dropped nearly 23% a day after surging nearly 177%.
Deere gained 6.6% following a full-year net income forecast raise from the world's largest farm-equipment manufacturer.
Coty fell nearly 8% after the CoverGirl cosmetics brand owner forecast current-quarter earnings below expectations and withheld its annual outlook, while Advance Auto Parts tumbled 26% after issuing a weaker annual sales forecast.
Declining issues outnumbered advancers by a 1.9-to-1 ratio on the NYSE where there were 121 new highs and 97 new lows. On the Nasdaq, 1,571 stocks rose and 3,101 fell as declining issues outnumbered advancers by a 1.97-to-1 ratio.
The S&P 500 posted 16 new 52-week highs and 3 new lows while the Nasdaq Composite recorded 57 new highs and 90 new lows.
(Reporting by Sinéad Carew in New York, Avinash P and Purvi Agarwal in Bengaluru, additional reporting by Koyena Das; Editing by Pooja Desai and David Gregorio)
