NEW YORK (AP) — The U.S. stock market is slipping on Thursday as Wall Street waits to see if more news coming about the economy’s health will be good news or bad.
The S&P 500 fell 0.6% in early trading, edging a bit further from its all-time high set late last month. The Dow Jones Industrial Average pulled back 94 points, or 0.2%, from its own record set the day before, while the Nasdaq composite was down 1.1%, as of 9:37 a.m. Eastern time.
The U.S.
government is reopening following a six-week shutdown, its longest in history. The stock market mostly rose through the shutdown, as it has often done historically, but Wall Street is bracing for potential swings as the government gets back to releasing important updates on the job market and other signals about the economy’s strength.
The fear is that the data could persuade the Federal Reserve to halt its cuts to interest rates, which can boost the economy but also worsen inflation. Wall Street has already run to records in part on expectations for more such cuts, and a pullback could hurt the stock market.
The “looming data deluge may spur additional volatility in the coming weeks,” according to Doug Beath, global equity strategist at Wells Fargo Investment Institute.
Traders have already reduced their bets that the Fed will cut its main interest rate at its next meeting in December, now seeing a nearly 54% of that, down from nearly 70% a week ago, according to data from CME Group.
That helped push yields higher in the bond market, which can weigh on prices for stocks and other investments.
The yield on the 10-year Treasury rose to 4.10% from 4.08% late Wednesday.
On Wall Street, The Walt Disney Co. helped lead the market lower after falling 8.4%. The entertainment giant reported profit for the latest quarter that topped analysts’ expectations, but its revenue fell short.
That helped offset a jump of 4.6% for Cisco after the tech giant delivered profit and revenue that were bigger than analysts estimated.
In stock markets abroad, indexes were mixed in Europe following modest gains in Asia.
Japan’s Nikkei 225 index rose 0.4%, even as tech giant SoftBank Group lost another 3.4%. It’s been struggling since it said it had sold all of its shares in chip maker Nvidia.
Worries have been rising worldwide about whether Nvidia and other superstar stocks caught up in the artificial-intelligence frenzy can add much more to their already spectacular gains.
Their sensational performances have been one of the top reasons the U.S. market has hit records despite a slowing job market and high inflation. Their prices have shot so high, though, that they’ve drawn comparisons to the 2000 dot-com bubble which ultimately dragged the S&P 500 down by nearly half after bursting.
Nvidia fell another 2.9% on Thursday and was the heaviest weight on the S&P 500. Other AI darlings also struggled. Palantir Technologies fell 2.9%, and Super Micro Computer lost 2.6%.
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AP Writers Teresa Cerojano and Matt Ott contributed.
