Stocks finished narrowly lower as banks reported and chips slid: Tuesday recap

Stocks finished Tuesday a touch lower, with the three major averages clustered just below where they opened. The S&P 500 slipped 0.02% to close at 7,805.45. The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 0.35%, or 180 points, to 51,670.10, and the Nasdaq Composite eased 0.15% to 27,204.38. A quiet close, on the surface. Underneath, the session turned on two threads pulling against each other: the opening results of bank earnings season and another down day for chip stocks.

Energy led the eleven S&P 500 sectors, rising 1.80%. Communication services added 0.75%, while utilities gained 0.58% and materials 0.57%. Health care sat at the far end, down 1.36%, the weakest group of the day. The spread ran wide. Financials fell 0.42% as the banks reported, industrials lost 0.28%, and consumer staples eased 0.26%. Technology barely moved, down 0.04%, its softness concentrated in one corner of the group.

The week’s rotation has pointed the same way. The pattern held. Over the past five sessions, the energy sector fund has climbed 5.41% while the technology fund has fallen 2.83%. The fund tracking the Nasdaq-100 is down 2.12% across that stretch, and the small-cap fund has lost 1.65%, while the Dow’s tracking fund has held slightly positive at 0.32%. The tilt has favored steadier, value-leaning corners of the market and leaned away from growth.

The banks set the early tone. JPMorgan opened the quarter with per-share earnings below Wall Street forecasts, and its shares fell during the session. Goldman Sachs went the other way, posting a sharp rise in profit on stronger trading and investment-banking fees, and its stock climbed. Wells Fargo slipped after its interest income came in light, while Citigroup also reported. The mixed scorecard left the financial sector slightly lower even as earnings season got underway.

Chip stocks supplied the other drag. Semiconductor shares fell for a fifth straight session, extending a slide tied to worries that Chinese memory manufacturers are gaining ground on established producers. The weakness has centered on makers of memory and storage components, and it has been enough to keep pressure on the Nasdaq even on days when the broader tape holds steady. Health care, the day’s weakest sector, carried its own story. Johnson & Johnson dropped sharply despite topping profit estimates, as softer medical-device sales overshadowed the beat.

Breadth leaned slightly negative. The small-cap Russell 2000, through its tracking fund, fell 0.43%, the softest corner of the major benchmarks. The fund tracking the Nasdaq-100 and the one tracking the Dow each eased about 0.33%, keeping the session’s selling in growth and smaller names more than across the broad market. The Cboe Volatility Index, the market’s gauge of expected swings, ticked up to 15.27. That is still a low reading, and it points to limited demand for downside protection even on a softer day.

The week stays busy from here. More large financial companies report through midweek, and a fresh reading on consumer inflation is due Wednesday, followed by data on retail sales and producer prices later in the week. Those releases fill out a stretch heavy with numbers on both the consumer and the banks. The calendar sets the agenda until they land.

This is a general-market summary for information only — not investment advice, and not a recommendation regarding any security.