NEW YORK (AP) — U.S. stock indexes inched lower Monday in a quiet open to trading for the week. Technology stocks fell, but gains for oil producers and other energy companies kept the losses in check.
KEEPING SCORE: The Standard & Poor’s 500 index slipped 2 points, or 0.1 percent, to 2,500, as of 10 a.m. Eastern time. The Dow Jones industrial average dipped 15 points, or 0.1 percent, to 22,334, and the Nasdaq composite dropped 32, or 0.5 percent, to 6,394.
Smaller stocks held up better than the rest of the market. The Russell 2000 index rose 4 points, or 0.3 percent, to 1,454.
TECH TURBULENCE: Tech stocks in the S&P 500 lost 1 percent, the steepest drop among the 11 sectors that make up the index. Losses were broad across the sector: Facebook fell 3.3 percent, chipmaker Nvidia lost 2.4 percent and semiconductor company Broadcom fell 1.7 percent.
ENERGIZED: The price of benchmark U.S. crude oil rose 65 cents, or 1.3 percent, to $51.31 per barrel. Brent crude, the international standard, gained 88 cents to $57.30 per barrel.
The higher prices helped lift stocks across the energy sector, which rose 1 percent. Marathon Oil gained 2.6 percent, and Noble Energy rose 2.4 percent.
REVVED UP: Genuine Parts jumped to the biggest gain in the S&P 500 after it said it would buy Alliance Automotive Group, a European distributor of auto parts, tools and workshop equipment. Genuine Parts valued the deal at $2 billion, including the repayment of debt.
Genuine Parts gained $6.15, or 7 percent, to $94.13.
MARKETS ABROAD: Germany’s DAX index rose 0.2 percent after Chancellor Angela Merkel won a fourth term. Merkel’s party and its allies, though, lost some seats as they turned in one of their weakest postwar results. The results sent the euro lower and underscored the tricky challenge Merkel has in forming a coalition with new partners to lead Europe’s biggest economy.
The CAC 40 fell 0.3 percent in Paris, and the FTSE 100 slipped 0.1 percent in London.
In Asia, Japan’s Nikkei 225 rose 0.5 percent, South Korea’s Kospi slipped 0.3 percent and Hong Kong’s Hang Seng fell 1.4 percent.
YIELDS: The yield on the 10-year Treasury note slipped to 2.24 percent from 2.25 percent late Friday. The two-year fell to 1.42 percent from 1.44 percent, and the 30-year held steady at 2.78 percent.
CURRENCIES: The euro fell to $1.1882 from $1.1941 late Friday, and the British pound slipped to $1.3519 from $1.3527. The dollar inched up to 112.15 Japanese yen from 112.05 yen.
COMMODITIES: Gold slipped 80 cents to $1,296.70 per ounce, silver fell 5 cents to $16.93 per ounce and copper lost a penny to $2.93 per pound.
Natural gas dropped 1 cent to $2.95 per 1,000 cubic feet, heating oil rose 2 cents to $1.83 per gallon and wholesale gasoline added 2 cents to $1.65 per gallon.
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