Financial Markets                      09/30 15:33

   

   NEW YORK (AP) -- Most of the U.S. stock market fell Wednesday as Wall Street 
contended with the downside of a 
https://apnews.com/article/economic-growth-inflation-trump-trade-b759367e9e6149f
e145652cc95887aa0 through its many challenges.

   The S&P 500 slipped 0.3% to close out its third losing month in the last 
four. The Dow Jones Industrial Average dropped 443 points, or 0.9%, and the 
Nasdaq composite added 0.2%.

   Stocks turned lower after data reports suggested the U.S. economy was even 
stronger during the spring than earlier thought. That helped yields remain high 
in 
https://apnews.com/article/bonds-rates-yields-wall-street-7d3ce7fdda0fd58afbeaf6
1293810a0c, which in turn kept up 
https://apnews.com/article/stock-markets-oil-war-inflation-6b70287210105d208eb09
44d589d31f2 weighing on stocks and all financial markets.

   The day began with gains for stocks following an encouraging report that 
said inflation 
https://apnews.com/article/consumer-spending-inflation-tariffs-wages-01d0c6f32f7
4d9101a39ca6007813b61 across the United States last month as economists 
expected. It said the cost of living for U.S. consumers was 3.4% higher overall 
in August than a year earlier. That was not as high as the 3.7% inflation rate 
that economists expected, even if it remained worse than the Fed's 2% target.

   The report followed 
https://apnews.com/article/consumer-prices-inflation-fed-interest-rates-c76f53f7
a53def0c464ca44ac637f203 from earlier in the month about 
https://apnews.com/article/producer-prices-inflation-economy-iran-66d1591b979271
ee7b79b113d715f6ef during August, but it's the one that 
https://apnews.com/article/federal-reserve-interest-rates-inflation-a633de46f84a
3487f3bdc03f788188fa prefers to use.

   Shorter-term Treasury yields fell as traders pared bets that the Fed will 
raise its main interest rate next month to get inflation further under control. 
They now see just a 37% chance of that, down from the coin flip's chance seen a 
day earlier, according to data from CME Group.

   That helped the yield on the two-year Treasury briefly fall toward 4.83% 
before it pulled back to 4.89%, where it was late Tuesday.

   But longer-term yields rose in the bond market. That's in part because 
worries about high inflation are just one of the reasons longer-term yields 
have jumped in the United States and around the world.

   The seemingly solid U.S. economy is another. Besides Wednesday's 
better-than-expected report on the overall U.S. economy, another update said 
growth in business activity in the Midwest was also stronger than economists 
expected.

   Much of the strength in the U.S. economy is due to consumers, who are 
increasing their spending by more than their incomes are rising.

   "The consumer remains resilient, in a much better position than previously 
thought," according to Gary Schlossberg, global strategist at Wells Fargo 
Investment Institute.

   Other factors sending Treasury yields higher are also continuing to churn, 
including worries about the big debt loads that Washington and other 
governments worldwide are supporting.

   Oil prices, meanwhile, rose in their latest swings amid uncertainty about 
when the 
https://www.google.com/goto?url=CAESUwHrOzAVANU6RFGBML0FsoB483emi3zvyhjult1UCzSz
KiDsh6BlwIvrSY1xJwc4lqojpelqA57FhfgUWs96kay3FYGcViR54CUDPKrf74qmnlKg will allow 
the flow of crude to be fully restored. Brent crude, the international 
standard, climbed 1.9% to settle at $98.03 per barrel.

   It all helped the yield on the 10-year Treasury, which is the centerpiece of 
the bond market, drop as low as 5.20% in the morning before rising to 5.29%. 
That's up from 5.26% late Tuesday, and it's back to where it was more than two 
decades ago in 2002.

   The 30-year Treasury yield, which takes into account expectations for 
inflation and economic growth many years down the line, climbed to 5.64% from 
5.59% late Tuesday.

   Higher yields slow the overall economy by making 
https://apnews.com/article/mortgage-interest-rate-30year-fb5f426270e80a7fd64264d
489efeeec for everyone, while undercutting prices for all kinds of investments.

   On Wall Street, Cal-Maine Foods dropped 0.7% after the country's largest egg 
company reported a larger loss for the latest quarter than analysts expected. 
With plenty of eggs available in the market, Cal-Maine Foods saw a sharp drop 
in prices it could charge, compared with a year earlier.

   Helping to limit the market's losses was Hewlett Packard Enterprise, which 
rose 3.9%. It increased its forecast for revenue from its networking business, 
which is benefiting from the boom in 
https://apnews.com/hub/artificial-intelligence technology.

   MongoDB climbed 3.4% after the database company's board boosted its program 
to send cash to shareholders by $1 billion through buybacks of its own stock. 
That helped MongoDB recover some of its sharp loss from earlier in the week, 
after it said Chirantan "CJ" Desai was stepping down as CEO for a senior role 
at Meta Platforms.

   All told, the S&P 500 fell 19.30 points to 7,651.54. The Dow Jones 
Industrial Average dropped 443.87 to 50,906.05, and the Nasdaq composite added 
63.52 to 26,861.06.

   In stock markets abroad, indexes dipped in Europe following a mixed finish 
in Asia. Japan's Nikkei 225 jumped 1.9%, while France's CAC 40 fell 0.9% for 
two of the world's bigger moves.

   ___

   AP Business Writers Yuri Kageyama and Michelle Chapman contributed to this 
report.

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