Stocks kick off the week lower: Dow drops 56 points

Wall Street got off to a slow start this week as stocks fell Monday after posting strong gains last week, which were powered by solid readings on jobs and manufacturing and market-friendly comments on interest rates from Federal Reserve chair Janet Yellen.

The Dow Jones industrial average, which jumped 277 points last week, or 1.6%, fell 55.75 points, or 0.3%, to 17,737.00. The Standard & Poor's 500 stock index fell 6.65, or 0.3%, to 2066.13 and the Nasdaq composite dropped 22.75, or 0.5% to 4891.80.

The S&P 500, which had been down as much as 10.5% this year, is now up 1.1% in 2016. The Dow is up 1.8% for the year but the Nasdaq is down 2.3% on the year.

Wall Street has erased the early-year stock market funk as fears of a recession in the U.S. have faded, oil prices have rebounded, and the Fed has hinted that it will be less aggressive with interest rate hikes this year. The Fed's latest thinking on rates has also pushed the value of the U.S. dollar lower, which is also helping boost stocks, as it boosts sales and earnings of U.S. multinationals.

This week, Wall Street will be focusing on more economic data, including February factory orders today and the March reading on the health of the services sector of the economy Tuesday.

Fed minutes to shed light on cautious stance

The Federal Reserve will also release the minutes of its March meeting on Wednesday, which could shed fresh light on why the central bank last month reduced the number of planned interest rate hikes this year to two from four.

Oil prices fell Monday as benchmark U.S. crude fell 92 cents $35.85 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange.

Stocks around the world were mixed. Japan's Nikkei 225 fell 0.3%. And shares were higher, but off their peaks, in Europe. The broad Stoxx Europe 600 index was up 0.4%. Germany's DAX index was up 0.3% and the CAC 40 in Paris was 0.5% higher.