Day Traders Diary

8/7/13

The S&P 500 settled lower by 0.4% to register its third consecutive decline. The benchmark index fell to its lows during the first hour of action before spending the remainder of the session in a slow climb.

Stocks sold off at the open after Asian indices endured a downbeat session with Japan's Nikkei falling 4.0% as dollar/yen continued its recent weakness. The pair fell below 97.00 into the Asian close and additional selling during the U.S. session pressured it into the 96.50 area.

The relative strength of most countercyclical sectors helped the benchmark index erase about half of its losses during the afternoon. Health care and telecom services ended little changed while utilities registered a modest gain of 0.5%. For its part, the consumer staples sector (-0.5%) lagged.

Although the S&P was able to trim its losses, the index could not regain its flat line as the underperformance of influential cyclical sectors weighed. Financials and discretionary shares both lost near 0.8%. In addition, the industrial sector outperformed with a loss of 0.2%, but transportation companies lagged notably.

The Dow Jones Transportation Average fell 0.7% as trucking companies led to the downside. CH Robinson (CHRW 56.31, -3.27) tumbled 5.5% after missing on earnings and revenue. Peer YRC Worldwide (YRCW 23.52, -5.06) also endured a rough session after it too reported disappointing results.

Elsewhere, most major bank shares registered losses and Bank of America (BAC 14.53, -0.11) slid 0.8% after the Department of Justice filed a pair of lawsuits alleging the bank has engaged in investor fraud when selling $850 million in residential mortgage-backed securities.

Also of note, the discretionary sector displayed broad weakness with notable losses among home builders and retailers. The iShares Dow Jones US Home Construction ETF (ITB 21.41, -0.49) slumped 2.2% and the SPDR S&P Retail ETF (XRT 80.78, -1.19) lost 1.5%.

Treasuries registered modest gains and the benchmark 10-yr yield fell five basis points to 2.60%.

So far, this week has featured two light-volume sessions and today was not much different. With 629 million shares traded on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange, today's final tally came up short of the 50-day average, which sits near 763 million.

Today's economic news was limited to just two data points. The weekly MBA Mortgage Index ticked up 0.2% to follow seven consecutive contractionary readings, including last week's decline of 3.7%.

Separately, June consumer credit increased by $13.8 billion, which follows the prior month's increase of $17.5 billion, and is higher than the $16.0 billion that had been broadly expected among economists polled by Briefing.com.

Tomorrow, weekly initial claims will be reported at 8:30 ET.

The U.S. Treasury will auction $16 billion in 30-yr bonds.

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