(Reuters) -
U.S. stocks were little changed on Monday as simmering tensions between the
United States and North Korea kept investors on edge, while a drop in oil
prices
weighed on energy shares.
Investors
also are awaiting this week's meeting at Jackson Hole, Wyoming, between Federal
Reserve Chair Janet Yellen and global central bankers. Investors are angling
for the slightest hint on where monetary policy is headed.
"That
confluence of strong growth and low inflation, which is somewhat like nirvana
for equity investors, we don't think can last forever," said Wayne Wicker,
chief investment officer at ICMA-RC in Washington, D.C.
"We're
hopefully getting a couple of more data points to see where the Fed takes their
temperature on where they're feeling the economy is at this juncture so that we
can anticipate if something happens in the fourth quarter or not."
The United
States and South Korea began long-planned joint military exercises on Monday,
heightening tensions with North Korea which called the drills a
"reckless" step toward nuclear conflict.
Part of the
recent decline was due to escalating tensions between the United States and
North Korea.
The S&P
500 energy index .SPNY was down 0.8 percent, leading sector declines in the
S&P 500, after crude oil prices fell nearly 2 percent, pulling back from
last week's rally.
The Dow
Jones Industrial Average .DJI was up 5.66 points, or 0.03 percent, to 21,680.17,
the S&P 500 .SPX had lost 0.01 points to 2,425.54 and the Nasdaq Composite
.IXIC had dropped 12.67 points, or 0.20 percent, to 6,203.86.
While the
benchmark S&P 500 index is still up 13.6 percent since the election, it had
fallen 2.1 percent in the last two weeks. That's the most since the two weeks
before the election.
Last week,
U.S. President Donald Trump fired chief strategist Steve Bannon and disbanded
some business councils, raising concerns about the Trump administration's
ability to implement its pro-growth agenda of tax cuts and infrastructure
spending.
The Dow
briefly fell below its 50-day moving average, while the S&P 500 remained
below the 50-day technical level.
Nike (NKE.N)
shares fell 2.8 percent after Jefferies cut its rating and price target on the
stock.
Johnson
Controls (JCI.N) rose 3.2 percent to $38.22, among the top S&P gainers,
after saying its CEO change would happen earlier than announced.
Herbalife
(HLF.N) was up 9.8 percent after the nutritional supplement maker said it would
buy back $600 million of shares after ending talks to be taken private.
Declining
issues outnumbered advancing ones on the NYSE by a 1.07-to-1 ratio; on Nasdaq,
a 1.53-to-1 ratio favored decliners.
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