Investing.com - Financials kept a lid on Wall Street midday Friday, as U.S. bond yields trended lower, while the SEC's lawsuit against CEO Elon Musk continued to weigh on Tesla, even as a report claimed the company had met its production guidance for Model 3s.
Financials, mostly banks, have not delivered the post-Fed glow that some investors had hoped for, sliding for a fifth-straight day, weighing on the broader market following weakness in U.S. bond yields.
JPMorgan Chase (NYSE:JPM), Goldman Sachs (NYSE:GS) and Citigroup (NYSE:C) traded lower.
The S&P Financials Sector index slipped about 0.70%.
While the SEC's lawsuit against Musk is expected to cap Tesla's stock price movement, the automaker does appear to be making good on its pledge to meet production targets for its Model 3.
Citing one person familiar with Tesla's production, online publication Electrek said the automaker made more than 51,000 Model 3 sedans, meeting its guidance to produce between 50,000 and 55,000 Model 3s in the July-September quarter.
Tesla delivers its production and delivery numbers next week.
That did little to support Tesla shares amid intense debate on Wall Street, as analysts sought answers to two pivotal questions concerning Tesla's future: how valuable is Musk to Tesla and how much cash does the company need to continue its production ramp?
Barclays said that if Musk were forced to leave because of the SEC action, Tesla's stock would shed its "Musk premium," worth about $130 a share. Others on the Street, however, touted further optimism, claiming a potential Musk departure would bring about a catalyst for a change in leadership.
Tesla (NASDAQ:TSLA) fell about 12%.
In Silicon Valley, meanwhile, Intel's gain proved AMD's loss after Chief Financial Officer Bob Swan allayed investor concerns over supply constraints, insisting the company had enough supply to meet its full-year revenue forecast.
Intel (NASDAQ:INTC) rose 3%, while rival chipmaker Advanced Micro Devices (NASDAQ:AMD) fell about 5.5%.
Elsewhere in tech, Facebook (NASDAQ:FB) fell nearly 3% after social media giant said that its engineering team had recently discovered a security vulnerability that affected nearly 50 million accounts.
That exacerbated the decline in the communications services sector, which was down 0.67%.