Overall Market Down, but Dow Tacks on 5.40

The stock market turned mixed Tuesday, with blue chip issues sustaining their record-setting winning streak in the face of a retreat by much of the broader market.

The Dow Jones average of 30 industrials rose 5.40 to 2,369.18, the sixth consecutive record close for the widely followed market average.

But in the broader market, declining issues outnumbered advancing issues by about eight to seven on the New York Stock Exchange, with 738 up, 850 down and 402 unchanged.

Many market watchers had been calling for stocks to pause or pull back on profit taking after their steady price gains of the five previous days, in which the Dow rose more than 115.

More Restrained

While the Dow industrials shot up by more than 30 on Monday, the broad market advance had been much more restrained.

Nationwide turnover in NYSE-listed issues, including trades in those stocks on regional exchanges and in the over-the-counter market, totaled 223.7 million shares.

Standard & Poor’s index of 400 industrials rose 0.68 to 346.50, and S&P;’s 500-stock composite index was up 0.48 to 301.64.

The Wilshire index of 5,000 equities closed at 3,014.739, up 2.621 or 0.09%, from Monday.

The American Stock Exchange index climbed 0.38 to 339.31; the NASDAQ composite index closed at 438.13, up 0.09.

Bond prices finished mostly lower in light to moderate trading Tuesday, pressured by the fall in the dollar’s value.

The Treasury’s closely watched 30-year bond fell 1/8 point, or $1.25 for every $1,000 in face value, while its yield edged up to 7.57% from Monday’s 7.56%.

“Yesterday, the blue chips were up, but the rest of the market was flat,” said Michael Metz of Oppenheimer & Co. “Today the blue chips are flat, and the rest of the market is down.”

Analysts said there probably was a slackening of buying by institutional money managers who had been “dressing up” their first-quarter reports to clients by showing themselves heavily invested in the booming stock market. Monday was one of the last days for stock purchases that would be completed by quarter’s end next Tuesday.

Stocks received some support from the Commerce Department’s report that durable goods jumped up 6% in February, the biggest gain in five months.

In the secondary market for Treasury bonds, prices of short-term government issues were unchanged to 1/16 point lower; intermediate maturities were up 1/32 to down 1/16 point, and 20-year issues lost 1/16 point, according to Salomon Bros.

Buoying the Dow

The movement of a point is equivalent to a change of $10 in the price of a $1,000 bond.

The federal funds rate, the interest on overnight loans between banks, was quoted late in the day at 6.125%, unchanged from Monday. The rate has moved little in recent weeks, remaining at relatively high levels.

Buoying the Dow industrials was American Express, which rose 1 3/4 to 78 5/8. The company on Monday announced a 2-for-1 common stock split and said it was selling up to 40% of its Shearson Lehman Bros. investment firm.