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Date Posted: 11:55:29 04/28/13 Sun
Author: U.S. Stocks Edge Mostly Lower,Friday 26/4/2013=180.5
Subject: Trimming Week's GainsThursday, the Chicago Board Options ExchangeApril 25th Anzac

U.S. Stocks Edge Mostly Lower, Trimming Week's Gains
27/04/2013 6:35AM

--U.S. stocks edge mostly lower after U.S. GDP misses expectations

--European benchmark snaps five-day winning streak

--Asia mostly lower, as Bank of Japan stands pat


By Matt Jarzemsky

Stocks edged mostly lower Friday, trimming their gains for the week, as investors weighed another round of corporate earnings and a lower-than-expected reading on economic growth.

The Standard & Poor's 500-stock index fell 2.92 points, or 0.2%, to 1582.24, snapping a five-day streak of gains. The Nasdaq Composite Index dropped 10.72 points, or 0.3%, to 3279.26.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average performed better, rising 11.75 points, or 0.1%, to 14712.55.

For the week, the S&P 500 added 1.7% and the Dow rose 1.1%, weathering mishaps that brought confusion to trading sessions. On Tuesday, stocks briefly plunged as a message on the Associated Press's Twitter account claimed there were two explosions at the White House. The market reversed the move just as quickly after the news organization said its Twitter account had been hacked and the posting was false.

On Thursday, the Chicago Board Options Exchange, the largest U.S. options exchange, closed for more than three hours because of a software glitch. The snafu knocked out two tools that banks and trading firms use to manage stock-market risk: options on the S&P 500 and the CBOE Volatility Index, or VIX.

"We have a pretty bullish outlook on the U.S.--the pullbacks are sort of just noise," said Greg Peterson, director of research at Ballentine Partners, which manages $3.8 billion in Waltham, Mass. "Growth is coming back, though it's slow and steady."

Friday's economic data failed to inspire investors. U.S. gross domestic product, a measure of all goods and services produced in the economy, rose at a lower-than-expected 2.5% annual rate between January and March, the Commerce Department reported. Though the latest consumer sentiment index from Thomson Reuters and University of Michigan sentiment index topped expectations.

"You had a very strong week, and [Friday] you had economic data that wasn't supportive of the market going up another day," said Seth Setrakian, head of global equities trading at First New York Securities. "People are moving to the sidelines ahead of the weekend and ahead of some potential volatility next week."

The coming week brings potentially market-moving events such as a Federal Reserve policy meeting and a handful of high-profile economic data, including the closely watched monthly jobs report.

Investors are also weighing the prospects for an interest-rate cut or other action by European Central Bank officials scheduled to meet Thursday, following another wave of disappointing economic data from the euro zone in recent days.

"All eyes are on the ECB next week," Mr. Setrakian said. "People are really trying to focus on the various outcomes that come out of that meeting--whether there's a rate cut, whether they'll do something unconventional, what Germany's views are on everything."

Among companies reporting earnings was Chevron, the second-largest U.S. oil company by market value. Its shares rose 1.3% after quarterly earnings topped analysts' expectations.

Amazon.com fell 7.2% after the e-commerce giant's first-quarter revenue, and the current quarter's revenue outlook, missed Wall Street estimates, offsetting better-than-expected first-quarter earnings.

D.R. Horton, the nation's largest home builder by annual closings, gained 8.7% after reporting earnings and revenue that topped analysts' forecasts.

European markets slumped, with the Stoxx Europe 600 dropping 0.3%, snapping a five-session streak of gains.

Most Asian markets also declined. China's Shanghai Composite lost 1% and Japan's Nikkei Stock Average erased early gains to a multiyear high to close down 0.3%. The Bank of Japan kept its monetary policy unchanged.

April gold futures slipped 0.6% to settle at $1,453.60 an ounce, while June crude-oil futures fell 0.7% to $93 a barrel. The dollar slipped against both the yen and the euro.

Elsewhere in the corporate arena, Pfizer slumped 0.6% after a European regulatory-advisory committee rejected the company's new treatment for rheumatoid arthritis.

J.C. Penney rallied 12% after hedge-fund giant Soros Fund Management disclosed that it took a 7.91% stake in the troubled department-store chain.

Write to Matt Jarzemsky at matthew.jarzemsky@dowjones.com


(END) Dow Jones Newswires

April 26, 2013 16:35 ET (20:35 GMT)

Copyright (c) 2013 Dow Jones & Company, Inc.

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