US Stocks tumble on speculative trading woes

The US stock market finished session lower on Friday, 29 January 2021, as risk aversion selloff triggered in reaction to news that Johnson & Johnson's (JNJ) one-dose coronavirus vaccine appears to be less potent against variants. Meanwhile, the sell-off partly reflected concerns about recent market volatility after Robinhood eased restrictions on certain stocks that have skyrocketed in recent trading.

At the close of trade, the Dow Jones Industrial Average index declined 620.74 points, or 2.03%, to 29,982.62. The S&P 500 index dropped 73.14 points, or 1.93%, to 3,714.24. The tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite Index shrank 266.46 points, or 2%, to 13,070.70. For the week, the Dow closed 3.2% lower, the S&P 500 down 3.3% and Nasdaq Composite off 3.5%. On a monthly basis, the Dow lost 2%, the S&P 500 shed 1.1% and the Nasdaq Composite gained 1.7%.

Johnson & Johnson fell 3.6% as one of the biggest weights on both the Dow and S&P500 after the drugmaker said its single-dose vaccine was 72% effective in preventing COVID-19 in the United States, with a lower rate of 66% observed globally.

ECONOMIC NEWS: US Pending home Sales Slip By 0.3% In December--US pending home sales index slipped by 0.3 percent to 125.5 in December after tumbling by 2.5 percent to 125.9 in November, a report released by the National Association of Realtors on Friday showed. Pending home sales decreased for the fourth consecutive month but were still up by 21.4 percent compared to the same month a year ago. A pending home sale is one in which a contract was signed but not yet closed. Normally, it takes four to six weeks to close a contracted sale.

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