US close: Stocks stall as House healthcare vote delayed
US stocks closed marginally lower on Thursday after a House of Representatives vote on President Donald Trump's healthcare plan was delayed.
Giving up modest gains from earlier in the session, the Dow Jones Industrial Average finished down almost five points at 20,656.58, the S&P 500 lost two and a half to close at 2,345.96 and the the Nasdaq composite moved down nearly four points to 5,817.69.
Crude oil prices did not help either, with West Texas Intermediate down 0.77% at $47.67 per barrel and Brent crude falling 0.22% to $50.53.
In currency markets, the dollar fell 0.3% against the pound to 0.7986, was up 0.1% verses the euro at 0.9271 and flat against the yen at 111.07.
Investors watching out for the House of Representatives vote on the Republican plan to repeal Barack Obama's Affordable Care Act, known as Obamacare, and replace it with their own 'Trumpcare' version were disappointed as the party pushed back the vote amid last-minute lobbying and negotiations.
The delay arose as competing centrist and conservative factions in the party battled over potential changes to the proposed
American Health Care Act, though officials said the vote could still be held on Friday.
Trump has said voting through the bill was crucial before action can be taken on his other plans.
Craig Erlam, senior market analyst at Oanda, said: “Trump’s difficulty in getting people on board with his plans was largely blamed for the market selling off earlier in the week, with investors apparently seeing this as a sign that Trump may also struggle to get his spending plans and tax changes through.
“Should the healthcare plan be approved by Congress then we could see a resumption of the Trump rally while a failure could leave markets vulnerable to a larger correction.”
Elsewhere in Washington, Federal Reserve chair Janet Yellen gave a speech a week after she hiked interest rates, though investors hungry for hints on monetary policy were left disappointed as she spoke only about financial education for children and did not take any questions from the press.
Instead, Fedspeak fans turned to Minneapolis Fed President Neel Kashkari, the lone dissenter against last week's rate increase, as he called for a detailed plan for how and when the Fed will reduce its $4.5trn balance sheet as soon as possible - and hold off on further rate increases until it publishes its plan on the balance sheet.
"There's no reason to hold it — there are a lot of policy tradeoffs we have to choose from," Kashkari told reporters at a Federal Reserve research conference in Washington.
"Once we come to consensus on those tradeoffs, I would like us to publish that as soon as possible. I think we would do ourselves a favor by giving the markets as much time as possible to understand it, prepare for it, so there are as few surprises as possible."
Meanwhile, San Francisco Fed chief John Williams, who said the median expectation from policymakers for a total of three to four interest rate hikes in 2017 "makes sense" if the economy continued progressing as expected.
He told the Wall Street Journal that continued progress in the economy would bring the Fed closer to the point of starting to normalise its balance sheet towards the end of the year.
On the data front, initial jobless claims were up 15,000 to 258,000 from the previous week’s average, which was revised up to 243,000 from 241,000. Analysts had been expecting a drop to 240,000.
The four-week moving average came in at 240,000, up 1,000 from the previous week’s average, which was revised up to 239,000 from 237,250.
Meanwhile, new home sales were up 6.1% to 592,000 from the revised January rate of 558,000. Economists had been expecting a smaller increase to 564,000. On the year, sales were up 12.8%.
The median price of a new home was $296,200, down 3.9% on the month and 4.9% compared to a year ago.
In corporate news, health stocks led the fallers, with insurer Unitedhealth off 1%, followed by the likes of Pfizer, Merck and Johnson & Johnson.
Du Pont was a big riser as European Union antitrust regulators came closer to clearing its merger with Dow Chemical, according to Reuters reports.
Five Below climbed 11.4% after better-than-expected earnings and the retailer said it would open 100 new stores this year.
PPG Industries was up 0.7% after Elliot Management said on Wednesday that it might use corporate rules to call a special shareholders meeting to get AkzoNobel – in which it holds a 3% stake – to talk to the US chemicals maker.
Microsoft fell 0.17% following news that it has agreed to license a number of automotive technology patents to Toyota Motor Corp.
Ford Motors was also down 1.15% after the carmaker posted an earnings outlook that was below expectations.
Nike recouped some of its losses after a big fall on the previous day.
Dow Jones - Risers
Nike Inc. (NKE) $55.38 2.69%
E.I. du Pont de Nemours and Co. (DD) $80.56 1.74%
Home Depot Inc. (HD) $147.99 0.43%
Visa Inc. (V) $88.86 0.38%
Goldman Sachs Group Inc. (GS) $231.90 0.36%
General Electric Co. (GE) $29.62 0.30%
American Express Co. (AXP) $77.84 0.22%
Boeing Co. (BA) $177.26 0.16%
Walt Disney Co. (DIS) $112.26 0.14%
Exxon Mobil Corp. (XOM) $81.85 0.12%
Dow Jones - Fallers
Unitedhealth Group Inc. (UNH) $165.29 -1.04%
Travelers Company Inc. (TRV) $121.29 -0.61%
Wal-Mart Stores Inc. (WMT) $69.89 -0.56%
Pfizer Inc. (PFE) $34.29 -0.52%
Coca-Cola Co. (KO) $42.17 -0.50%
Chevron Corp. (CVX) $107.87 -0.48%
Cisco Systems Inc. (CSCO) $33.96 -0.41%
Apple Inc. (AAPL) $140.92 -0.35%
Merck & Co. Inc. (MRK) $63.28 -0.35%
Johnson & Johnson (JNJ) $125.90 -0.29%
S&P 500 - Risers
PVH Corp. (PVH) $98.55 8.48%
Tenet Healthcare Corp. (THC) $17.02 4.03%
TripAdvisor Inc. (TRIP) $42.52 2.71%
Cabot Oil & Gas Corp. (COG) $22.85 2.70%
Nike Inc. (NKE) $55.38 2.69%
American Airlines Group (AAL) $41.41 2.63%
Southwestern Energy Co. (SWN) $7.54 2.45%
Huntington Bancshares Inc. (HBAN) $13.02 1.88%
Chesapeake Energy Corp. (CHK) $5.09 1.80%
Sl Green Realty Corp. (SLG) $107.59 1.75%
S&P 500 - Fallers
Frontier Communications Co. (FTR) $1.94 -8.06%
Accenture Plc (ACN) $120.82 -4.52%
Centene Corp. (CNC) $65.31 -3.97%
FedEx Corp. (FDX) $189.20 -3.44%
H&R Block Inc. (HRB) $22.76 -2.53%
Dollar General Corp (DG) $68.90 -2.52%
Whole Foods Market Inc. (WFM) $29.20 -2.41%
Baker Hughes Inc. (BHI) $59.16 -2.28%
Marathon Oil Corp. (MRO) $14.69 -2.26%
FMC Technologies Inc. (FTI) $31.41 -2.03%