US stocks end flat to open heavy earnings week

NEW YORK, United States (AFP) — Wall Street stocks finished little changed Monday at the start of a week dominated by earnings from Bank of America, Netflix and other giants.

Equities paused in a quiet session after both the Dow and S&P 500 finished at records on Friday following solid earnings from JPMorgan Chase and other large banks.

Bank of America and Goldman Sachs report results early Tuesday, while IBM, Visa and General Electric will release results later in the week.

Analysts expect companies in the S&P 500 to report a 6.2 percent gain in second-quarter earnings. Expectations of solidly higher earnings, along with fairly low interest rates, have propelled stocks to multiple records in 2017.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average dipped less than 0.1 percent to 21,629.72.

The broad-based S&P 500 fell a hair to 2,459.14, while the tech-rich Nasdaq Composite Index rose less than 0.1 percent to 6,314.43.

Asset management firm BlackRock fell 3.1 percent after reporting that second-quarter net income came in at $5.25 per share, 15 cents less than expected.

Dow members Procter & Gamble rose 0.5 percent after activist investor Nelson Peltz called for deep cost cuts and said he would seek a board seat.

FedEx fell 1.6 percent after it disclosed that the financial impact associated with the June virus attack of its TNT Express unit will “likely” be material. FedEx said TNT’s operations were “significantly affected” by the information system virus.

© Agence France-Presse