Wall St ends mixed in truncated Black Friday trading
By Stephen Culp
NEW YORK (Reuters) -U.S. stocks ended little changed in holiday-shortened trading on Friday, with low volume and conviction as investors watched the start of the seasonal shopping season for signs of consumer resiliency.
The S&P 500 closed nominally higher, while the Dow eked out a modest gain. The Nasdaq was dragged slightly lower by weakness in megacap momentum stocks.
All three indexes notched their fourth consecutive weekly gains.
«We had mixed macroeconomic data and the post-Thanksgiving session is only half a day, so there aren't that many participants,» said Peter Cardillo, chief market economist at Spartan Capital Securities in New York. «But we're seeing a market that's on the right path of a year-end rally.»
Retailers around the world were attempting to attract millions of shoppers, many offering steep «Black Friday» discounts the day after the U.S. Thanksgiving holiday.
«Consumers are being very frugal and while they might spend, they're looking for bargains,» Cardillo added. «The higher cost of money is hitting consumers' pocketbook.»
A survey by NRF, a U.S. retail trade group, showed U.S. shoppers are planning to spend an average of $875 on holiday purchases this year, an annual increase of about 5%.
S&P Global's advance purchasing managers' index (PMI) showed steady U.S. business activity in November, but private sector employment declined for the first time in almost 3-1/2 years, possibly due to the Federal Reserve's restrictive monetary policy.
Next week's most anticipated data include the Commerce Department's second estimate on third-quarter gross domestic product on Thursday, followed on Friday by its wide-ranging Personal Consumption Expenditures (PCE) report, which will provide
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