US STOCKS-Wall Street falls as recession worries persist

Aerojet Rocketdyne Holdings

19/12/2022 19:44

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      L3Harris slides after $4.7 bln Aerojet buyout 
    

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      Fed policy worries dominate mood
    

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      Indexes down: Dow 0.85%, S&P 1.19%, Nasdaq 1.64%
    

  
 (Updates to afternoon prices, adds commentary)
    By Sinéad Carew and Sruthi Shankar
       Dec 19 (Reuters) - Wall Street equities were in the red
on Monday with Nasdaq leading declines as investors worried the
Federal Reserve's monetary policy tightening campaign could push
the U.S. economy into a recession.
    The three major U.S. stock indexes were on track for the
fourth straight day of declines since Wednesday, Fed Chair
Jerome Powell took a more hawkish tone than expected when the
central bank raised interest rates. Powell promised further
increases even as weak data showed signs of a weakening economy.
  
    The S&P 500  .SPX , the Dow Industrials  .DJI  and the
Nasdaq have sold off sharply for December, on track  their
biggest annual declines since the 2008 financial crisis.
    With no big earnings reports or economic data on Monday,
investors focused on fears about the economy and interest rates,
according to Melissa Brown, Global Head of Applied Research at
Qontigo in New York.  
        "It's a knife edge between whether we're going to teeter
into a recession or have a soft landing. Is the Fed acting
appropriately?" said Brown who also noted that moves may be
exaggerated as many investors take vacation around the
end-of-year holidays.
  
        "Investors have not necessarily changed their view in
aggregate but those who have are driving the market right now
and driving bigger changes in stock prices because of low
trading volume," she said.
  
    By 2:27 p.m. ET (1927 GMT), the Dow Jones Industrial Average
 .DJI  fell 278.55 points, or 0.85%, to 32,641.91, the S&P 500
 .SPX  lost 45.88 points, or 1.19%, to 3,806.48 and the Nasdaq
Composite  .IXIC  dropped 175.96 points, or 1.64%, to 10,529.45.
   
    The biggest sector decliners on the day were communications
services  .SPLRCL , technology  .SPLRCT  and consumer
discretionary  .SPLRCD . The strongest sector was energy
 .SPNY , which was last down 0.4%.       
        Market heavyweights such as Apple Inc  AAPL.O ,
Microsoft Corp  MSFT.O  and Amazon.com Inc  AMZN.O  created some
of the biggest drags on the market.  
  
    Trading in Tesla Inc  TSLA.O  was volatile with the electric
carmaker's stock last down 0.5% after falling as much as 2.8%
during the session following a Twitter poll that showed a
majority of respondents want Tesla Chief Executive Elon Musk to
step down as CEO of the social media platform.
    Meta Platforms  META.O  was down 3.9% after the European
Commission said it could impose a fine of up to 10% of the tech
conglomerate's annual global turnover if evidence showed an
infringement of the EU's antitrust laws.
    L3Harris Technologies Inc  LHX.N  was down 2.8% after the
U.S. defense contractor said it would buy hypersonic engine
manufacturer Aerojet Rocketdyne Holdings Inc  AJRD.N  for $4.7
billion. Aerojet added 1.5%.
    Shares of casino operator Melco Resorts & Entertainment
 MLCO.O  were down more than 9%; Las Vegas Sands Corp  LVS.N  
fall almost 2%; and Wynn Resorts  WYNN.O  fell more than 5%
after Macau said on Friday that six casino firms will invest
around $15 billion as part of new 10-year contracts they signed
to operate in the world's biggest gambling hub. 
       Declining issues outnumbered advancing ones on the NYSE
by a 3.03-to-1 ratio; on Nasdaq, a 2.81-to-1 ratio favored
decliners.
  
        The S&P 500 posted 5 new 52-week highs and 17 new lows;
the Nasdaq Composite recorded 45 new highs and 393 new lows.  
  
 (Reporting by Sinéad Carew, Sruthi Shankar, Shubham  Batra,
Johann M Cherian and Sruthi Shankar in Bengaluru; Editing by
Saumyadeb Chakrabarty, Maju Samuel and David Gregorio)
 ((sinead.carew@thomsonreuters.com))