Renewed selling on fears of a recession dragged the Dow Jones Industrial Average lower on Friday and pushed the S&P 500 into correction territory.
The 30-stock Dow fell 366.71 points, or 1.12% to close at 32,417.59. The S&P 500 slipped 0.48% to finish the session at 4,117.37, closing 10.3% lower from this year’s peak on July 31. The Dow was pressured by declines in JPMorgan Chase after CEO Jamie Dimon said he planned to sell 1 million shares next year.
The Nasdaq Composite held 0.38% higher to 12,643.01, thanks to shares of Amazon. Amazon added more than 6% after the e-commerce giant trounced analysts’ expectations for revenue and earnings in the third quarter. Other megacap tech stocks such as Microsoft followed Amazon shares higher.
All three major averages registered steep weekly losses. The Dow and S&P 500 are down 2.1% and 2.5%, respectively, for the week. The Nasdaq has fallen 2.6% in that time, dragged down by sharp weekly declines in Meta Platforms and Google-parent company Alphabet.
“We still have a shaky economic outlook. So while the third quarter GDP print was extraordinarily high, I think everybody still expects that the US economy is going to slow down. The only question there is how much is it going to slow down and how fast,” said Dave Sekera, chief U.S. market strategist at Morningstar.
The decline in key tech stocks pushed the Nasdaq into correction territory after falling more than 10% from its closing high in July on Wednesday. This week also saw the index record its worst trading day since February.
Disappointing earnings have pressured the market this week. Ford dropped 14% week to date after the company missed third-quarter expectations and pulled its guidance for the year, citing the UAW strike. Chevron shares were down 13% on the week, after the energy giant reported earnings.
Traders also weighed new inflation data after the core personal consumption expenditures reading for September was released ahead of the Federal Open Market Committee meeting next week. Core PCE increased 0.3% in last month and 3.7% year over year, matching estimates from economists polled by Dow Jones. Consumer spending increased 0.7%, however, surpassing estimates of 0.5%. PCE is the Federal Reserve’s preferred inflation gauge.
