US stocks tick lower as Middle East tensions rise
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US stocks are drifting lower on Thursday as momentum wanes from their big rally that had brought them to the brink of their record.The S&P 500 was 0.3% lower in early trading. The Dow Jones Industrial Average was down 246 points, or 0.6%, as of 9:35 a.m. Eastern time, and the Nasdaq composite was 0.3% lower.Boeing was one of the main reasons for the Dow's struggles. It lost 5.5% after Air India said a London-bound flight crashed shortly after taking off from Ahmedabad airport Thursday with 242 passengers and crew onboard. The Boeing 787 Dreamliner crashed into a residential area near the airport five minutes after taking off. The cause of the crash wasn't immediately known.In the bond market, Treasury yields eased following another encouraging update on inflation. Thursday's said inflation at the wholesale level wasn't as bad last month as economists expected, and it followed a report on Wednesday saying something similar about the inflation that U.S. consumers are feeling.Wall Street took it as a signal that the Federal Reserve will have more leeway to cut interest rates later this year in order to give the economy a boost.The Federal Reserve has been hesitant to lower interest rates, and it's been on hold so far this year after cutting at the end of last year, because it's been waiting to see how much President Donald Trump's tariffs will hurt the economy and raise inflation. While lower rates can goose the economy by encouraging businesses and households to borrow, they can also accelerate inflation.The yield on the 10-year Treasury fell to 4.36% from 4.41% late Wednesday and from roughly 4.80% early this year.Besides the inflation data, a separate report on jobless claims also helped to weigh on Treasury yields. It said slightly more U.S. workers applied for unemployment benefits last week than economists expected, and the total number remained at the highest level in eight months.On Wall Street, Oracle jumped 9.6% after the tech giant reported stronger profit and revenue for the latest quarter than analysts expected.In stock markets abroad, indexes were mixed across Europe and Asia amid mostly modest movements. Hong Kong's Hang Seng was an outlier, and it tumbled 1.4% to give back some of its strong recent gains. It's still up nearly 20% for the year so far.
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