Technology stocks continued to fall in morning trading on Monday, following sharp losses at the end of last week. But energy stocks rose with the price of oil and helped to keep U.S. indexes relatively steady ahead of a busy week full of central-bank meetings, corporate earnings reports and the monthly U.S. jobs report.
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KEEPING SCORE: The S&P 500 was down 3 points, or 0.1 percent, at 2,815, as of 10:30 a.m. Eastern time. The Dow Jones industrial average rose 20 points, or 0.1 percent, to 25,473, and the Nasdaq fell 54, or 0.7 percent, to 7,683.
Three stocks rose on the New York Stock Exchange for every two that fell.
TECH LOSSES: Technology stocks in the S&P 500 slumped 1.2 percent for the sharpest loss among the 11 sectors that make up the index. It follows a rough week for the industry after earnings reports from Facebook and Twitter raised concerns about their growth and sent their shares plummeting. Twitter dropped 4.7 percent to $32.53, following its 20.5 percent plunge on Friday.
Even with its recent tumble, though, the technology sector remains one of the leaders for the S&P 500 for the year thanks to its outsized gains earlier.
HIGH ENERGY: Energy stocks in the S&P 500 climbed 0.9 percent after the price of benchmark U.S. oil spurted higher by $1.49, or 2.2 percent, to $70.18 per barrel. Brent crude, the international standard, rose 86 cents to $75.62.
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RATE WATCH: The Federal Reserve will begin a two-day meeting Tuesday on interest-rate policy. The Fed has said that it expects to raise rates two more times in 2018, but few economists expect a move at this upcoming meeting.
More action may come from the Bank of England, which is expected to raise its key interest rate by a quarter of a percentage point on Thursday as inflation remains high. The Bank of Japan will also be meeting this week.
YIELDS: The yield on the 10-year Treasury note rose to 2.97 percent from 2.96 percent late Friday. It’s been climbing for the last couple of weeks and is close to breaching 3 percent for the first time since May.
JOB GAINS: The U.S. jobs report is usually the most anticipated piece of economic data each month, and it arrives on Friday. Both the job market and economy have been strong recently, and economists expect Friday’s report to show that employers added 193,000 jobs in July. That would be a slight slowdown from June’s growth of 213,000.
COMMODITIES: Gold inched up 20 cents to $1,223.20 per ounce. Silver rose 1 cent to $15.51 per ounce, and Copper slipped a penny to $2.80 per pound.
MARKETS ABROAD: Japan’s Nikkei 225 fell 0.7 percent, South Korea’s Kospi slipped 0.1 percent and the Hang Seng in Hong Kong lost 0.2 percent.
In Europe, France’s CAC 40 fell 0.2 percent, and the DAX in Germany dropped 0.3 percent. The FTSE 100 in London was virtually flat.
CURRENCIES: The dollar slipped to 110.98 Japanese yen from 111.00 yen late Friday. The euro rose to $1.1711 from $1.1656, and the British pound rose to $1.3147 from $1.3113.
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AP Writer Annabelle Liang contributed from Singapore.
