Losses Piling Up for S&P 500 as Weekly Drop Is Worst Since June
- S&P 500 down 0.7% after Friday Fed talk sends stocks lower
- Defensive industries lead way down as financials gain on week
Pedestrians pass the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) in New York, U.S., on Friday, Aug. 26, 2016. U.S. stocks rose as investors focused on Federal Reserve Chair Janet Yellen's bullish comments on the economy and signaled more skepticism that Federal Reserve officials will follow through with interest-rate increases.
Photographer: Michael Nagle/BloombergWhat had been just a sleepy August is turning into an increasingly painful one for U.S. equity market bulls.
Notwithstanding an hour-long burst of optimism that followed Federal Reserve Chair Janet Yellen’s policy speech Friday, the buoyancy that lifted stocks for the first half of the summer has now been missing for the better part of a month. The S&P 500 Index fell 0.7 percent to 2,169.04 this week, the biggest drop since June, to erase its August gains.