U.S. Construction Spending Falls, Apple Completes $17 Billion Bond Offering

Nichole Harper
01 May, 2013
New York City

Stocks on Wall Street showed a negative bias after construction sector activities declined in March and U.S. manufacturing growth slowed. Apple completed the $17 billion bond offering, the largest bond deal in corporate history. European markets and several Asian markets were closed for May Day.

[R]11:20 AM New York – Stocks on Wall Street showed a negative bias after construction sector activities declined in March and U.S. manufacturing growth slowed. Apple completed the $17 billion bond offering, the largest bond deal in corporate history. European markets and several Asian markets were closed for May Day.[/R]

Stocks on Wall Street declined after a batch of mixed earnings and on weaker than expected revenues from Merck, a decline in construction activities and in U.S. manufacturing sector growth.

European and several markets in Asia were closed for May Day holiday.

In New York, the S&P 500 index declined 0.4% and the narrow index of 30 stocks, the Dow decreased 0.3%. Index in Toronto fell 0.8% and in London struggled to stay near flat line.

March Construction Activities Fall 1.7%

The construction spending decreased 1.7% in March from February, according to the Commerce Department today.

The activities declined for the second time in three months and January data was revised lower to a decline of 4% from the previous estimate of 2.1%.

Despite the recent month-to-month fall, the construction activities increased 4.8% from a year ago March month at a seasonally adjusted $856.7 billion.

In March, private sector activities increased 0.4% and government sector activities declined 4.1%, single largest monthly fall since March 2002 and private sector residential building declined 1.5%.

U.S. Manufacturing Growth Slows

Separately, a private survey conducted by the Institute for Supply Management said its index of national factory activities declined to 50.7 in April from 51.3 in March.

Forward-looking new orders increased to 52.3 from 51.4 and production index improved to 53.5 from 52.2.

U.S. Private Sector Job Growth Fell

A private survey conducted by Automatic Data Processing and Moody’s Analytics indicated private sector job creation was 119,000 in April, less than expected 155,000.

The broader and far more reliable government job report is scheduled to be released on Friday.

World Markets

Markets in Europe were closed for the May Day holiday. In London, FTSE 100 index gained 0.3% after manufacturing activities increased more than expected.

Markets in Japan, mainland China and Hong Kong and South Korea were closed to celebrate International Labor Day and in India to celebrate a religious holiday.

Stocks in Review

Apple Inc ((AAPL)) surged as much as 3% before falling down 1% after the company completed the $17 billion bond offering, the largest corporate-bond deal in history.

The company plans to use the proceeds as part of a plan to return $100 billion to shareholders before the end of 2015.

Facebook ((FB)) decreased 1.2% after rallying 8% in the last eight trading days ahead of earnings after the close and investors expect a rise in mobile ad revenues.

Merck ((MRK)) dropped 2.4% after the drug maker said first-quarter revenues were lower than expected on patent expirations.

Comcast said first quarter net soared 18% to $1.44 billion and MasterCard first quarter net climbed 12.3% to $766 million.

Reuters first quarter net swung to $17 million loss. Valero first quarter net swung to $654 million profit.