Markets Right Now: US stocks end flat after 2 down days
By Associated Press
May 5, 2016 3:11 PM CDT

NEW YORK (AP) — The Latest on developments in financial markets (all times local):

4:00 p.m.

U.S. stocks ended the day nearly flat as indexes stabilized after two days of losses.

Energy companies rose with the price of oil and health care stocks advanced. Consumer companies and telecommunications stocks were the biggest decliners.

A number of companies fell after releasing results that didn't impress investors. Electric car maker Tesla sank 5 percent and cereal maker Kellogg fell 3 percent.

The Dow Jones industrial average rose 9 points, less than 1 percent, to 17,660. The Standard & Poor's 500 index fell a half of a point, to 2,050. The Nasdaq composite fell 8 points, or 0.2 percent, to 4,717.

Bond prices didn't move much. The yield on the 10-year Treasury note held steady at 1.78 percent.

11:45 a.m.

The energy sector is leading the stock market higher in midday trading as indexes stabilize after two days of losses.

Apache rose 7 percent Thursday and Newfield Exploration climbed 6 percent.

Several companies were also rising after reporting earnings that beat analysts' forecasts. Discovery Communications rose 5 percent and Allstate added 4 percent.

The Dow Jones industrial average rose 60 points, or 0.4 percent, to 17,712.

The Standard & Poor's 500 index added six points, or 0.3 percent, to 2,057. The Nasdaq composite edged up 14 points, or 0.3 percent, to 4,740.

The price of U.S. crude oil climbed 3 percent to almost $45 a barrel in New York.

Bond prices didn't move much. The yield on the 10-year Treasury note held steady at 1.78 percent.

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9:40 a.m.

Energy stocks are leading an early gain on Wall Street as the market stabilizes after two days of losses.

Oil producers were rising in early trading Thursday as the price of oil jumped about 3 percent. Newfield Exploration climbed 6 percent.

Several companies were also rising after reporting earnings that beat analysts' forecasts. Discovery Communications and Allstate each rose 5 percent.

The Dow Jones industrial average rose 48 points, or 0.3 percent, to 17,697.

The Standard & Poor's 500 index added four points, or 0.2 percent, to 2,055. The Nasdaq composite edged up 10 points, or 0.2 percent, to 4,735.

Bond prices fell. The yield on the 10-year Treasury note rose to 1.79 percent.

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9:40 a.m.

European markets are making solid gains after a difficult start to May that had its roots in concerns over the state of the global economy, primarily the scale of the slowdown in China.

The mood appears to have steadied somewhat in the run-up to Friday's nonfarm payrolls report for April.

The economic data that's come out of the U.S. this week has been mixed, with the private payrolls report from ADP worse than anticipated.

Kit Juckes, a strategist at Societe Generale, is cautioning against reading too much from the ADP release for April as it has a "poor correlation" with the official data and, in any case, the 156,000 jobs it estimated wasn't far off the recent average. "In other words, it tells us very little," Juckes said.

Germany's DAX is up 0.7 percent at 9,902 while the CAC-40 in France has risen 0.4 percent to 4,341. The FTSE 100 index of leading British shares is up 0.6 percent at 6,150.