Wall street drops on disappointing earnings results

Major equity indexes in the U.S. struggled to build on their recent gains and closed the day modestly lower on Thursday as the disappointing earnings results from big banks weighed on the financials.

JPMorgan Chase and Citibank reported a decrease in their trading revenue and their shares lost 1% and 3% respectively today. Bank of America and Wells Fargo, which are going to release their third-quarter earnings report on Friday, also fell 1% and 1.5%, dragging the S&P 500 Financials Index 0.8% lower on the day. Commenting on bank shares' price action, “the first bank results were OK, but I guess people might be wondering about reported and continued sluggishness in loan growth and a little bit of an uptick in credit quality concerns. Over the next few days we’ll get many more reports and more material for people to study,” John Carey, portfolio manager at Pioneer Investment Management in Boston, told Reuters.

On the other hand, despite a higher-than-expected drawdown in the U.S. crude oil stocks, the barrel of West Texas Intermediate settled at $50.60 (-0.4%), weighing on the S&P 500 Energy Index (SPNY), which ended 0.4% lower.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average lost 32.33 points, or 0.14%, to 22,840.56, the S&P 500 dropped 4.42 points, or 0.17%, to 2,550.82 and the Nasdaq Composite fell 11.51 points, or 0.17 percent, to 6,592.04.

Headlines from the NA session:

• Fed's Fischer: It's always better to have an independent central bank
• WTI retraces losses above $50 post-EIA report
• EIA: US commercial crude oil inventories decreased by 2.8 mln barrels
• Fed's Brainard: Below target inflation is an important consideration for monpol
• US PPI consistent with moderate inflation - Wells Fargo
• Global growth strengthening, price pressures remain muted - Scotiabank
• US: Producer Price Index for final demand advanced 0.4% in September
• US: Weekly initial claims was 243,000, a decrease of 15,000 from previous week