Investing.com – Wall Street headed lower on Monday as investors focused on President Donald Trump’s recent executive order and opted to take risk off the table.
At 11:36AM ET (16:36GMT), the Dow Jones fell 185 points, or 0.92%, the S&P 500 lost 22 points, or 0.95%, while the Nasdaq Composite traded down 1.20%, or 1.20%.
Traders will likely continue to focus on Trump for further details on his promises of tax reform, infrastructure spending and deregulation as well as trade policies.
Sentiment was bruised after Trump on Friday suspended travel to the United States from Syria, Iraq, Iran and four other Muslim-majority countries, saying the moves would help protect Americans from terrorist attacks.
The executive order led to huge protests in many U.S. cities and sparked global backlash, raising worries about the potentially destabilizing impact of Trump's policies.
Several U.S. tech companies such as Google (NASDAQ:GOOGL), Apple (NASDAQ:AAPL) and Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT) have criticized the ban, while Starbucks (NASDAQ:SBUX) chief executive Howard Schultz promised that the company would hire 10,000 refugees globally.
Some experts critiqued the method in which the new President went about implementing the order, with nervousness over how Trump’s actions will affect international trade and what further measures will be implemented.
In economic news, data out Monday was mixed while personal spending continued to rise in December in line with expectations, but personal income advancing slightly less than expected.
The core PCE price index, a preferred gauge of inflation for the Federal Reserve (Fed), measured an annual rise of 1.7% in December, in line with expectations and the prior month’s upwardly revised reading.
In the real estate market, pending home sales once again showed strength in December with a 1.6% rise that beat expectations for a 1.1% increase.
In any case, market participants were also taking positions ahead of the Fed’s policy decision announcement on Wednesday or the jobs report on Friday.
Investors will also continue to focus on earnings as tech giants Apple (NASDAQ:AAPL), Facebook (NASDAQ:FB) and Amazon (NASDAQ:AMZN) as well as major drug companies Merck (NYSE:MRK) and Pfizer (NYSE:PFE) will release this week.
With 107 out of 500 S&P firms already having reported fourth quarter earnings, The Earnings Scout warned that despite a 67% beat rate on profit, only 25% of those companies had first quarter estimates raised with the average settling at a decline of 0.88% so far.
Meanwhile, oil prices were lower near midday trade on Monday, kicking the week off on negative footing as prospects of rising U.S. production weighed on the market.
Oilfield services provider Baker Hughes said late Friday that the number of rigs drilling for oil in the U.S. increased by 15 last week, the twelfth gain in 13 weeks and its highest level since November 2015.
U.S. crude futures lost 0.81% to $52.74 by 11:38AM ET (16:38GMT), while Brent oil traded down 0.458% to $55.45.