Posted on: Tuesday, December 7, 2004
Oil prices, bleak 2005 outlook dampen stocks
By Michael J. Martinez
Associated Press
NEW YORK — Oil supply concerns and broker downgrades of blue-chip companies left stocks mixed yesterday, raising doubts that Wall Street's year end rally would continue.
The rise in oil futures — a barrel of light crude was quoted at $42.98, up 44 cents, on the New York Mercantile Exchange — was prompted by a terrorist attack in Saudi Arabia and protests in Nigeria that raised safety concerns about the world's oil supply. The gains reversed a four-day downward trend that allowed Wall Street to look past a disappointing jobs creation report on Friday.
The Dow Jones industrial average fell 45.15, or 0.43 percent, to 10,547.06.
The Standard & Poor's 500 index was down 0.92, or 0.08 percent, at 1,190.25, and the Nasdaq composite index gained 3.29, or 0.15 percent, to 2,151.25.
While some analysts felt investor optimism would be enough to overcome lingering questions about the economy and oil prices, others felt the problems could become too great for investors to ignore.
Falling third-quarter sales at Circuit City Stores Inc. gave investors more reason for concern over retail stocks and a slow holiday shopping season.
Declining issues outnumbered advancers by nearly 4 to 3 on the New York Stock Exchange, where preliminary consolidated volume came to 1.75 billion shares, compared with 2.01 billion on Friday.
The Russell 2000 index of smaller companies was down 3.18, or 0.5 percent, at 639.03.
Brokerages lowered their ratings on three Dow components — Pfizer Inc., Alcoa Inc. and Verizon Communications Inc. — illustrating the difficulties many companies may have in posting strong profits next year.
