Market Snapshot: Dow sinks by about 200 points as Nasdaq Composite gives up perch at 16,000

How are stock benchmarks trading?

• The Dow Jones Industrial Average
  DJIA,
  -0.66%
  fell 205 points, or 0.6%, to 36,230.

• The S&P 500
  SPX,
  -0.54%
  traded 21 points, or 0.4%, lower to reach around 4,680.

• The Nasdaq Composite Index
  COMP,
  -0.59%
  retreated 76 points, or 0.5%, to about 15,903.

Though the advance was modest, S&P 500 on Monday scored its eighth straight gain, its longest winning streak since April 2019. The Dow, S&P 500, Nasdaq Composite and Russell 2000
RUT,
-0.56%
all finished at record highs after the House of Representatives late Friday passed infrastructure spending legislation that is expected to be signed into law by President Joe Biden.

What’s driving the market?

Investors on Tuesday may be discovering that markets also fall, following a protracted period of buoyancy for the main stock indexes that have been described as a so-called “melt up” by some market bulls and bears alike.

Consumer discretionary stocks, financials, and communication services were facing the greatest degree of selling pressure Tuesday, with the downturn jeopardizing an eight day win streak for the S&P 500 and an 11-session run-up for the Nasdaq Composite.

Tesla
TSLA,
-9.61%
shares dropped, weighing on the S&P 500 and Nasdaq Composite, after founder Elon Musk on the weekend asked in a Twitter poll if he should sell 10% of his stock, with a majority of respondents saying he should.  

The Federal Reserve’s twice-a-year financial stability report said valuation measures are high across most asset classes. It noted that stock prices relative to earnings forecasts are at the upper end of its historical distribution, and the yields on Treasury securities, corporate bonds and leverage loans are at low levels relative to their history.

Even with the retrenchment, the complexion of the market remains bullish.

“As scary as these heights feel, the market continues trading well. We’ve been solidly overbought for weeks, yet buyers keep throwing even more money at these record highs,” said Jani Ziedins, who authors the Cracked Market blog.

Read: ‘It’s a melt-up’: U.S. stocks are on an unusually strong run heading into the holidays

Meanwhile, traders will have to consider the possibility of a change in leadership at the Federal Reserve, after Bloomberg News reported that Fed. Gov Lael Brainard interviewed for the role currently held by Jerome Powell. Powell’s still considered likely to be nominated to serve a second term as chairman.

U.S. stocks looked to remain under pressure Tuesday after the October producer-price index rose 0.6%, in line with expectations. The pace of wholesale inflation over the past 12 months was flat at 8.6%. That is the highest level since the index was reconfigured in 2009, and likely one of the highest readings since the early 1980s.

Earlier, the National Federation of Independent Business said its gauge of small-business confidence slipped by 0.8 points to 98.2 last month, its lowest reading since March.

Which companies are in focus?

• Shares of General Electric Co.
  GE,
  +3.87%
  were up 4.5% after the industrial conglomerate announced plans to split into three publicly traded companies.

• PayPal
  PYPL,
  -12.18%
  led the losses in financial stocks after the payments company fell short of expectations with its holiday-quarter outlook while also announcing a new arrangement with Amazon.com Inc. through which Venmo users will be able to use the service as a checkout option on the e-commerce giant’s platform.

• AMC Entertainment Holdings Inc.
  AMC,
  -10.32%
  late Monday reported quarterly results that beat expectations across the board. Shares of the popular meme stock were down around 9%.

• Shares of Hertz Global Holdings Inc.
  HTZZ
  were trading 5.2% loweron the Nasdaq Tuesday, after the car-rental company announced overnight that an upsized public offering of shares priced at the top end of the expected range. Hertz emerged from bankruptcy protection in July.

• PayPal Holdings Inc.
  PYPL,
  -12.18%
  shares were down over12% after the payments company fell short of expectations with its holiday-quarter outlook Monday, while also announcing a new arrangement with Amazon.com Inc.
  AMZN,
  +2.14%
  through which Venmo users will be able to use the service as a checkout option on the e-commerce giant’s platform.

• Shares of Roblox Corp.
  RBLX,
  +32.40%
  surged by about 33% after the social-gaming platform late Monday said its October performance would still top last year’s, despite a three-day outage over the Halloween weekend.

How are other markets faring?

• The yield on the 10-year Treasury note BX:TMUBMUSD10Y fell 5.4 basis points to 1.44%. Yields and debt prices move in opposite directions.

• The ICE U.S. Dollar Index, a measure of the currency against a basket of six major rivals, was off 0.1%.

• Oil futures edged higher, with the U.S. benchmark
  CL00,
  +0.83%
  up 1.2% at $82.87 a barrel. Gold futures
  GC00,
  +0.12%
  edged up 0.1% at $1,830.30 an ounce.

• The Stoxx Europe 600
  SXXP,
  -0.19%
  closed down 0.2%, while London’s FTSE 100
  UKX,
  -0.36%
  ended 0.4% lower.

• The Shanghai Composite
  SHCOMP,
  +0.24%
  and Hong Kong’s Hang Seng Index
  HSI,
  +0.20%
  each rose 0.2%, while Japan’s Nikkei 225
  NIK,
  -0.75%
  fell 0.8%.