Wall Street declined overnight on a weak housing report, despite some strong earnings results. The Commerce Department said that construction starts on privately owned homes rose 0.5 per cent to 590,000, lower than expectations.
Wall Street hit new highs for the year over optimism of the corporate earnings. The rise was led by Caterpillar as a broker said the company was among the best-positioned companies to benefit from improving global growth and spending on construction, infrastructure and commodities.
US stocks climbed to a 2009 new high on Thursday, as the oil prices surge buoyed energy companies. New York crude oil futures rose more than 3 per cent to a one-year high of US$77.58 a barrel after the government said US gasoline reserves fell sharply last week. The financial and IT stocks retreated over mixed economic data and corporate outlook.
Dow Jones Industrial Average edged higher overnight towards the 10,000 points psychological level, helped by a market confidence on corporate earnings of blue chip companies. Energy stocks were also up on the back of a jump in crude oil prices.
Dow index hit a fresh 2009 high on Friday after the earnings season kicked off. Upbeat forecasts on IT giants IBM and Intel fueled the market's growing expectations over a profit recovery. S&P's 500 and Nasdaq both gained more than 4.5 per cent for the week.
Overnight the Dow index and S&P's 500 index posted their biggest falls in three months as the worse-than-expected manufacturing activity data in September and new jobless claims led to a broad sell-off. These figures overshadowed improvements in pending home sales, personal spending and construction spending, and dampened investors confidence on the economy recovery.
Wall Street closed lower overnight after American consumer confidence reading in September dropped unexpectedly. The weakness in US technology stocks, which had been a leader for much of Wall Street's six-month rally, yesterday led a fall in the market. The Conference Board's consumer confidence index dipped in September to 53.1 from 54.5 in August as people worries about job market.
