By Yasin Ebrahim
Investing.com – The Dow notched its best month since 1987 despite ending the month on a sour note, paced by declines in financials and materials as investors mulled over further signs of the coronavirus-led damage on the economy.
The {{169|Dow Jones Industrial Average}} lost 1.2%, the S&P 500 fell 0.9%, while the Nasdaq Composite slumped 0.3%.
With signs that the U.S. consumer, the backbone of the economy, is in trouble as the jobless claims continue to mount, investors seemingly pulled their bullish bets on stocks.
The U.S. Department of Labor reported Thursday that initial jobless claims slowed to a pace of 3.8 million, compared with 4.4 million last week, but still above economists' forecasts of 3.5 million.
Consumer spending, which accounts for more than two-thirds of U.S. economic activity, fell 7.5% last month, the steepest monthly decline on record.
Financials were among the biggest decliners, giving up its recent gains, as the weaker economic data cooled expectations that a partial economic reopening would kickstart the labor market and potentially lead to a decline in credit losses for big Wall Street banks.
But large-cap tech stocks proved a resilient, led by Facebook, as investors cheered bullish earnings.
Facebook (NASDAQ:FB) rose 5.4% after the social media giant reported revenue that topped consensus estimates and said it was seeing signs of stability in ad revenue after a coronavirus-led slowdown in March.
Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT) gained 1.1% as the tech giant beat estimates on both the top and bottom lines.
Twitter (NYSE:TWTR), meanwhile, closed 7.8% lower on fears its slowing ad revenue, which fell 27% from March 11 to March 31, is set to continue.
Apple (NASDAQ:AAPL) and Amazon.com (NASDAQ:AMZN), both of which report earnings after the bell, were up 2.2% and 4.4% respectively.
Elsewhere, Tesla (NASDAQ:TSLA) gave up some gains to close 2.3% lower even as the electric automaker's surprise quarterly profit triggered a wave of price target upgrades from Wall Street firms.
Energy, meanwhile, fell more than 1%, shrugging off a jump in oil prices even as concerns of supply constraints persist.