The Dow Jones Industrial Average spent most of the day in the red Tuesday before fighting back for a 4.24-point gain, closing at 12,878.28.
The Nasdaq inched up 0.44 points to 2,931.83 and the S&P 500 shed 1.27 points to end at 1,350.50.
Investors were put off by a Commerce Department report that found retail sales increased a slower rate than expected (0.4%) in January, well below the 0.7% increase most economists had predicted.
Meanwhile, import prices rose 0.3% in January, according to the Labor Department as petroleum and food rebounded strongly. Economists had been looking for only a 0.2% bump.
In Europe, Rating agency Moody's warned it may cut the triple-A ratings of France, the United Kingdom and Austria, and downgraded the ratings for a handful of countries including Italy, Portugal, Spain, Slovakia, Slovenia and Malta.
Here are some more details from Tuesday’s trading session:
Dow Jones Industrial Average:
- Up two consecutive trading days and five of the last six sessions.
- Up 77.05 points, or 0.60%, over the two-day trading period.
- Down 9.08% from its record close of 14164.53 on October 09, 2007.
- An intraday high of 12878.88 occurred at 16:00:00 today, representing an increase of 4.84 points, or 0.04%.
- An intraday low of 12786.93 occurred at 14:32:39 today, representing a decrease of 87.11 points, or 0.68%.
- Sixteen of the 30 component stocks rose, 14 fell.
- Today's top five contributors to The Dow's movement and their point contribution: CAT (5.68), BA (5.37), KO (3.48), WMT (3.25), HPQ (2.50).
- Today's bottom five laggards: DD (-7.11), IBM (-3.03), JPM (-2.88), BAC (-2.04), UTX (-1.82).
- Up 96.70% from its 12-year closing low of 6547.05 on March 9, 2009.
- Up 5.33% from 52 weeks ago.
- Up 4.19% from its 2012 closing low of 12359.92 on January 06, 2012.
- Down 0.09% from its 52-week high of 12890.46 on February 09, 2012.
- Up 20.86% from its 52-week low of 10655.30 on October 03, 2011.
- Month-to-date: up 1.94%.
- Year-to-date: up 5.41%.
Dow Jones U.S. Total Stock Market Index:
- Dow Jones U.S. Total Stock Market, 14088.05, down 18.39 points, or 0.13%, or approximately $24.0 billion in market capitalization. .
- Down two of the past three trading days.
- Up 1.51% from 52 weeks ago.
- Down 0.15% from its 2012 closing high of 14109.41 on February 09, 2012.
- Up 6.67% from its 2012 closing low of 13206.64 on January 04, 2012.
- Down 10.53% (or approximately 2.8 trillion in market cap), from its record close of 15745.39 on October 09, 2007.
- Up 107.17% (or approximately $8.4 trillion in market cap), from the 12-½ year closing low of 6800.08 on March 9, 2009.
- Down 1.54% from its 52-week high of 14308.37 on April 29, 2011.
- Up 24.68% from its 52-week low of 11299.07 on October 03, 2011.
- Month-to-date: up 3.11%, or approximately $501 billion in market cap.
- Year-to-date: up 8.21%, or approximately $1.3 trillion in market cap.
Data courtesy of Dow Jones Indexes.
