LONDON (ShareCast) - (ShareCast News) - Wall Street appears headed for a mixed close going into the weekend following the release of a somewhat underwhelming US jobs report for October.
As of 1458 GMT, the Dow Jones Industrials was down by 0.07% or 14.17 points at 23,501.35, alongside a dip of 0.03% or 0.71 points to 2,579.14 for the S&P 500 although the Nasdaq Composite was ahead by 0.22% or 14.98 points to 6,792.69.

To take note of,some traders were likely already eyeing the upcoming Veterans Day holiday on 10 November and engaging in position squaring.

According to the Department of Labor, the US economy added just 261,000 new jobs last month (consensus: 313,000).

Upwards revisions to prior months' data and an unexpected further fall in the unemployment rate to 4.1% (consensus: 4.2%) more than made up for that 'miss', yet wage growth again fell well short of forecasts, with average hourly earnings running at a 2.4% clip year-on-year versus 2.8% in the month before.

Nevertheless, Michael Gapen at Barclays wrote to clients that: "Although some may be willing to look through the drop in the U3 rate due to the volatility in participation, we note that declines in the unemployment rate have generally held during the recovery.

"We believe the same will happen this time around as well. Hence, the risk to a substantial undershooting of the Fed's long-run unemployment rate is rising, meaning that gradual normalization should continue even amid sub-target outturns on inflation."

As an aside, the day before strategists at Bank of America-Merrill Lynch had cautioned clients that their Bull&Bear indicator had risen last week to 7.3 as a result of narrower equity 'breadth' and declining inflows into bonds and equities.

"But stay long risk assets until sentiment reaches euphoric territory of 8.0," they added.

Acting as a backdrop, on Thursday night House Republicans presented their proposals for tax cuts which included a permanent reduction in the corporate tax rate from 30% to 20%.

As well, President Donald Trump nominated then current Federal Reserve governor Jerome Powell - who some analysts believed might take a softer approach to financial sector regulation than Janet Yellen - to become the next US central bank chief.

In other economic news, Commerce reported that US factory orders rose by 1.4% on the month in September (consensus: 1.3%), on the back of which Barclays revised its tracking estimate for the rate of growth in third quarter US GDP from 3.1% to 3.3%.

Also making headlines ahead of the opening, stock in Apple was had halved its opening gains to trade roughly 2% higher towards $171.80 after hitting an intra-day and 52-week high at $174.26.

The smartphone maker had posted stronger-than-expected third quarter earnings per share and revenues of $2.07 and $52.6bn, respectively, on Thursday night. First quarter 2018 sales guidance also topped analysts' estimates.

Meanwhile, and from a sector standpoint, the best performance was being put in by the following industrial groups: Electronic office equipment (2.95%), Computer hardware (2.13%) and durable household products (1.51%).

Elsewhere on the corporate front, Duke Energy posted third quarter earnings per share of $1.59 (consensus: $1.55), giving stock in the electricity distributor a small lift.

Meanwhile, shares in auction house Sotheby's on the other hand came under selling pressure on the heels of much weaker than forecast EPS for the latest three-month stretch of 78 cents.

Stock of Teva Pharmaceuticals was also on the front foot even after the company lowered its outlook for full-year profits and sales.

Revenues were now seen in a range of between $22.2bn and $23.2bn, respectively, with EPS between $3.77 and $3.87.

Teva had previously guided towards earnings between $4.30 and $4.50.

Dow Jones - Risers

Apple Inc. (AAPL) $171.69 2.13%
Wal-Mart Stores Inc. (WMT) $89.53 1.81%
McDonald's Corp. (MCD) $168.55 1.31%
United Technologies Corp. (UTX) $121.20 0.90%
Home Depot Inc. (HD) $164.03 0.81%
3M Co. (MMM) $231.90 0.75%
Unitedhealth Group Inc. (UNH) $210.86 0.63%
Coca-Cola Co. (KO) $46.06 0.57%
Nike Inc. (NKE) $55.31 0.44%
Walt Disney Co. (DIS) $98.68 0.33%

Dow Jones - Fallers

Intel Corp. (INTC) $46.35 -1.58%
Goldman Sachs Group Inc. (GS) $244.37 -1.02%
Verizon Communications Inc. (VZ) $47.44 -0.82%
International Business Machines Corp. (IBM) $152.16 -0.78%
Exxon Mobil Corp. (XOM) $83.30 -0.68%
JP Morgan Chase & Co. (JPM) $100.99 -0.59%
Johnson & Johnson (JNJ) $139.38 -0.40%
Visa Inc. (V) $110.67 -0.36%
Travelers Company Inc. (TRV) $133.05 -0.31%
General Electric Co. (GE) $19.88 -0.30%

S&P 500 - Risers

NRG Energy Inc. (NRG) $27.06 8.92%
Teradata Corp. (TDC) $36.02 8.20%
L Brands Inc (LB) $47.13 8.06%
Yum! Brands Inc. (YUM) $79.60 7.12%
Dentsply International Inc. (XRAY) $65.50 7.10%
Zoetis Inc (ZTS) $68.62 6.37%
Fluor Corp. (FLR) $46.36 4.27%
Endo International Plc (ENDP) $6.19 4.03%
Marathon Oil Corp. (MRO) $15.45 3.90%
Citrix Systems Inc. (CTXS) $85.45 3.75%

S&P 500 - Fallers

Newell Brands Inc (NWL) $31.61 -22.90%
Frontier Communications Co. (FTR) $8.65 -5.83%
Tenet Healthcare Corp. (THC) $13.56 -5.47%
Zimmer Biomet Holdings Inc (ZBH) $109.01 -5.28%
Mallinckrodt Plc Ordinary Shares (MNK) $30.52 -4.80%
American International Group Inc. (AIG) $61.87 -4.79%
Time Warner Inc. (TWX) $93.78 -4.69%
TEGNA Inc (TGNA) $11.80 -4.65%
ONEOK Inc. (OKE) $52.10 -4.46%
Lennar Corp. Class A (LEN) $54.73 -3.92%

Nasdaq 100 - Risers

Mercadolibre Inc. (MELI) $260.19 10.25%
Dentsply International Inc. (XRAY) $65.50 7.10%
Citrix Systems Inc. (CTXS) $85.45 3.75%
Hologic Inc. (HOLX) $39.57 2.99%
Henry Schein Inc. (HSIC) $78.50 2.88%
Starbucks Corp. (SBUX) $56.40 2.79%
Align Technology Inc. (ALGN) $238.77 2.27%
Apple Inc. (AAPL) $171.69 2.13%
NetEase Inc. Ads (NTES) $281.18 1.84%
Dollar Tree Inc (DLTR) $94.23 1.81%

Nasdaq 100 - Fallers

Liberty Global Plc Lilac Class C (LILAK) $21.82 -3.28%
Activision Blizzard Inc. (ATVI) $63.37 -3.18%
Liberty Global Plc Lilac Class A (LILA) $21.73 -3.16%
Discovery Communications Inc. Class A (DISCA) $16.80 -2.95%
Discovery Communications Inc. Class C (DISCK) $15.81 -2.77%
Liberty Global plc Series A (LBTYA) $31.01 -1.93%
Liberty Global plc Series C (LBTYK) $29.92 -1.87%
Western Digital Corp. (WDC) $87.11 -1.68%
Intel Corp. (INTC) $46.35 -1.58%
Automatic Data Processing Inc. (ADP) $112.77 -1.37%

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