Stocks mixed as Apple rallies
Stocks were mixed in early trading Monday, cooling a late Friday rally on speculation of further monetary stimulus in the U.S.
The Dow Jones industrial average lost 29 points, or 0.2%, to 13,129 shortly after the opening bell on Wall Street. The broader Standard & Poor’s 500 index was down 1 point, or 0.1%, to 1,410. The Nasdaq was up 1 point, essentially flat at 3,071.
Apple Inc. shares rallied following the company’s $1-billion victory in a patent lawsuit with rival Samsung. Apple stock gained $14.05, or 2%, to $677.27 a share.
The Dow ended Friday up 100 points following the release of a letter in which Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke wrote that “there is scope for further action by the Federal Reserve to ease financial conditions and strengthen the recovery.”
Later this week, investors will be scrutinizing Bernanke’s remarks when he delivers a scheduled speech on monetary policy at a symposium in Jackson Hole, Wyo., on Friday.
In Europe, reports Monday had German politicians casting doubt on how the Eurozone’s debt crisis would be resolved.
The head of the German central bank questioned the European Central Bank’s plans to buy Italian and Spanish bonds to ease those countries’ borrowing costs, Reuters reported.
Also, the news agency said, a senior official in the Bavarian Christian Social Union party predicted that Greece would leave the currency union in 2013.
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