Wall Street edges along on tepid bank earnings, media stocks drag

By Sruthi Shankar

(Reuters) - Wall Street was largely unchanged late on Thursday morning as a rise in technology stocks helped negate another tumble in media stocks and results from JPMorgan and Citigroup that failed to enthuse.

The two Wall Street banks, which had already talked down third-quarter expectations, managed to beat Wall Street's profit estimates but reported a drop in trading revenue.

JPMorgan fell more than 1 percent, while Citigroup dropped more than 2 percent. Bank of America and Wells Fargo, which will report on Friday, were also lower, leading the financials index down 0.36 percent.

"Not a huge reaction to earnings despite relatively healthy quarter out of the early reporters. The risk is similar to the second quarter in that stocks are being priced for perfection," said Bryan Reilly, senior investment analyst at CIBC Atlantic Trust.

"But the strength in the global economy has accelerated and a weakening dollar should set up companies for very healthy beats in Q3."

With the S&P 500 up about 14 percent in 2017, investors are betting on strong earnings growth across the S&P 500.

AT&T tumbled more than 4 percent after the company said its third-quarter results took a hit from the string of hurricanes and that it lost 90,000 video subscribers in the quarter.

That, along with a brokerage Guggenheim raising concerns over subscriber losses at Disney and Viacom, sent fresh jitters across a sector that was hit a day earlier by President Donald Trump's suggestion to challenge TV network licenses over 'fake news'.

At 11:04 a.m. ET (1504 GMT), the Dow Jones Industrial Average was down 10.02 points, or 0.04 percent, at 22,862.87, the S&P 500 was down 2.31 points, or 0.09 percent, at 2,552.93 and the Nasdaq Composite was down 1.34 points, or 0.02 percent, at 6,602.20.

Six of the 11 major S&P indexes were lower, led by a more than 2 percent fall in the telecom services index due to AT&T's declines.

The consumer discretionary sector lost 0.44 percent, weighed down by media stocks.

Disney dropped 1.25 percent. Viacom sank 4.28 percent after also warning that Charter Communications subscribers may lose access to its channels as the expiration looms for a distribution deal.

Charter fell 1.16 percent. Other big decliners were Comcast, which tumbled 3.05 percent.

A 1 percent jump in Microsoft led the gains in the technology sector, which is the best performing this year among the 11 major sectors.

Advancing issues outnumbered decliners on the NYSE by 1,432 to 1,274. On the Nasdaq, 1,372 issues fell and 1,318 advanced.

(Reporting by Sruthi Shankar in Bengaluru; Editing by Savio D'Souza)