Stocks fell Friday as the ongoing debt ceiling debate in Washington hit a stalling point and investors continued to digest a better-than-feared first-quarter earnings season.
The S&P 500 (^GSPC) fell 0.22% in afternoon trading, while the Dow Jones Industrial Average (^DJI) dropped more than 100 points, or 0.37%. The technology-heavy Nasdaq (^IXIC) fell 0.29%.
Stocks had risen over the past several sessions as the debt debate appeared to be making progress in Washington.
“It’s time to press pause because it’s just not productive,” Rep. Garret Graves told reporters on Friday. Graves had been tapped by Speaker of the House Kevin McCarthy to lead the talks for the Republicans.
President Biden is expected to host a press conference when he returns from Japan on Sunday.
Big tech had been leading a week-long rally. On Thursday, Netflix (NFLX), Apple (AAPL), Alphabet (GOOGL), Meta (META), Microsoft (MSFT), and Nvidia (NVDA) all finished at their highest levels in at least a year.
Shares of Deere & Company (DE), the parent company of John Deere, fell 2% on Friday as the company upped its profit outlook for the fiscal year. The maker of tractors and other farming equipment beat Wall Street estimates for both revenue and earnings.
“Deere continues to benefit from favorable market conditions and an improving operating environment,” Deere & Company CEO John C. May said in the company’s earnings release. “Though supply-chain constraints continue to present a challenge, we are seeing further improvement.”
Meanwhile, Foot Locker (FL) shares tanked 26% at the open, their biggest drop since February 2022, as the footwear retailer slashed its full-year guidance for earnings per share from a prior range of $3.35-$3.65 to a new range of $2.00-$2.25. The company also missed Wall Street’s quarterly estimates for revenue and earnings per share while comparable sales declined 9% from the same period a year prior.
“Our sales have since (March) softened meaningfully given the tough macroeconomic backdrop, causing us to reduce our guidance for the year as we take more aggressive markdowns to both drive demand and manage inventory,” Foot Locker CEO Mary Dillon said in the company’s earnings release.
A quiet economic data day is headlined by commentary from Federal Reserve chair Jerome Powell and former Fed Chair Ben Bernanke at an event in Washington, D.C. While investors are closely watching for any indications on the Fed’s next interest rate move, Powell didn’t signal any shifts in the Fed’s stance.
“We’ll be monitoring as we assess the extent to which additional policy firming may be appropriate to return inflation to 2% over time,” Powell said. “That assessment will be an ongoing one. As we move ahead meeting by meeting having come this far, we can afford to look at the data and the evolving outlook and make careful assessments.”
Josh is a reporter for Yahoo Finance.
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