Stocks inch higher in quiet trading
NEW YORK - Stocks finished mostly higher Friday as they wrapped up a quiet week of trading. The Standard & Poor's 500 index fluctuated early on, but managed to eke out a small gain as telecommunications and financial stocks rose. Disney dragged down the Dow Jones industrial average after the company said ESPN lost three million subscribers in the last year. Oil prices slumped, dragging down energy stocks.
NEW YORK - Stocks finished mostly higher Friday as they wrapped up a quiet week of trading.
The Standard & Poor's 500 index fluctuated early on, but managed to eke out a small gain as telecommunications and financial stocks rose. Disney dragged down the Dow Jones industrial average after the company said ESPN lost three million subscribers in the last year. Oil prices slumped, dragging down energy stocks.
The Dow fell 14.90 points, or 0.1 percent, to 17,798.49. The S&P 500 picked up 1.24 points, or less than 0.1 percent, to 2,090.11. The Nasdaq composite index added 11.38 points, or 0.2 percent, to 5,127.52.
U.S. markets were closed Thursday for the Thanksgiving holiday, and closed at 1 p.m. Friday.
Stocks didn't have much momentum in a week of light trading. The market made its biggest weekly gain of 2015 last week, but this week the Dow fell 0.1 percent and the S&P 500 rose less than 0.1 percent.
Oil prices dropped. Benchmark U.S. crude fell $1.33, or 3.1 percent, to $41.71 a barrel in New York. Brent crude, a benchmark for international oil, gave up 60 cents, or 1.3 percent, to $44.86 a barrel in London.
Prudential Financial market strategist Quincy Krosby said oil prices gained a premium this week because of geopolitical concerns like increased military action against the Islamic State, and growing tensions between Russia and Turkey after Turkey shot down a Russian fighter plane on Tuesday.
Krosby said those gains may not last long. Next week, OPEC will hold a meeting in Vienna, Austria, and the group could send oil prices higher by deciding to cut back on production. Or it could decide to keep producing oil at its present rate, which might make prices fall further.
Disney fell $3.54, or 3 percent, to $115.13, its biggest one-day loss since August. Late Wednesday, Disney disclosed that U.S. subscribers to its ESPN sports channel fell for the second year in a row, to 92 million as of Oct. 3, matching the lowest total since 2006. ESPN's subscriber totals had hovered around 100 million for years.