Stocks faded in the final hour of trading to close mixed Friday, with major indexes logging a second weekly decline, pressured by news of JPMorgan's trading loss and amid ongoing worries over the euro zone.
The blue-chip index logged its biggest weekly drop this year.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average slipped 34.44 points, or 0.27 percent, to close at 12,820.60. JPMorgan saw its biggest selloff in almost 9 months, while Verizon gained.
The S&P 500 erased 4.60 points, or 0.34 percent, to finish at 1,353.39. The Nasdaq squeezed out a gain of 0.18 points, or 0.01 percent, to end at 2,933.82 points. The CBOE Volatility Index, widely considered the best gauge of fear in the market, ended near 20.
For the week, the Dow tumbled 1.67 percent, the S&P 500 fell 1.15 percent, and the Nasdaq dipped 0.76 percent. Cisco was the biggest weekly laggard on the Dow, while Disney rallied.
Among the key S&P sectors, materials led the weekly decliners, while telecoms finished higher.
Stocks got a lift earlier in the session following a report that consumer sentiment rose to its highest level since 2008in May.
But most of the day's focus was on JPMorgan after the banking giant disclosed that it suffered a trading loss of at least $2 billionfrom a failed hedging strategy. The firm estimates the business unit with the portfolio will post a loss of $800 million in the current quarter, excluding private equity results and litigation expenses. The bank previously forecast the unit would make a profit of about $200 million.
JPMorgan’strading loss, initially announced after-the-bell Thursday, dragged on the entire banking sector, pulling shares of Citigroup, Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley lower. At least five brokerages slashed their price target on JPMorgan, while FBR and Stifel cut their rating on the firm to "market perform" from "outperform" and "hold" from "buy," respectively.
“The ripple effect from financials will spread across,” said Todd Schoenberger, managing principal of The BlackBay Group. “This has been a chaotic week—I don’t know how a retail investor could be comfortable investing in this market.”
