Stocks opened in the red to start the four-day trading week following a slew of mixed earnings reports. So why are stocks down today?
Well, as states all over the country deal with a surprise cold front, Wall Street also seems to be cooling down a bit today. Indeed, both Dow Jones Industrial Average, S&P 500 and Nasdaq Composite are in the red this morning, down 0.45%, 0.1%, and 0.2%, respectively.
It seems investors may be responding to Boeing’s (NYSE:BA) recent downgrade from Wells Fargo to “equal weight” from “overweight,” the result of continued issues with its 737 Max 9 plane. BA stock is down about 6.5% at the time of writing.
Earnings have also been a point of focus among investors, with big banks first to show. Goldman Sachs (NYSE:GS) shares are up about 1.5% today after the bank announced surging fourth-quarter earnings. Interestingly, Morgan Stanley (NYSE:MS) is down more than 3.5% despite beating Q4 revenue estimates.
Why Are Stocks Down Today?
The New York Federal Reserve’s Empire State Manufacturing Survey was also released today. According to firms that responded to the survey, business activity dropped in December, falling to the lowest level of activity since May 2020. Richard Deitz, economic research advisor at the New York Fed, noted the changes:
“New York manufacturing activity fell sharply in January following a significant decline in December. While the survey’s headline index has fluctuated in recent months, this outsized drop suggests January was a difficult month for New York manufacturers, with employment and hours worked also contracting,”
This mostly sums up the bearish catalysts fueling today’s downtick. Wall Street is coming off its 10th week of gains, out of 11, with each of the indices climbing last week. Particularly the S&P and Nasdaq, which logged 1.8% and 3% gains to end the week. For the Nasdaq, this marked the largest weekly increase since November.
Whether it renews this climb for the rest of the week remains to be seen.
On the date of publication, Shrey Dua did not hold (either directly or indirectly) any positions in the securities mentioned in this article. The opinions expressed in this article are those of the writer, subject to the InvestorPlace.com Publishing Guidelines.
