U.S. Shares Fall as Credit-Card Woes Offset Technology Gains

(Bloomberg) -- U.S. stocks slipped, with the S&P 500 Index trimming its weekly advance, as losses in credit-card providers offset gains in technology companies that were sparked following better-than-expected results from Amazon.com Inc. and Google parent Alphabet Inc.

The S&P 500 fell 0.2 percent at 4 p.m. in New York while the Dow Jones Industrial Average lost a similar amount, led by Intel Corp. Small-cap shares saw the worst of selling as the Russell 2000 Index sank 1.2 percent.

Despite the losses, all three benchmarks have advanced at least 1.5 percent this week, hitting or approaching record highs, as the first round of the French election eased risk that the European Union might unravel and the Trump administration released its guidelines for tax cuts.

• Since earnings season began, 81 percent of S&P 500 companies have exceeded profit estimates and 65 percent beat on sales, data compiled by Bloomberg show.
• Synchrony Financial tumbled the most in the S&P 500 today, sinking 16 percent, after the issuer of private-label credit cards set aside more money for soured loans in the first quarter than analysts expected.
• Capital One Financial Corp. and Discover Financial Services also dropped after a surge in soured credit-card loans hurt profit at the two lenders.
• Alphabet gained 3.7 percent to a record after beating analysts’ sales projections in the first quarter, ending a four-year streak of missing Wall Street estimates after the holidays. 
• Amazon advanced 0.7 percent, also to a record, after it showed no signs of slowing an unbroken 20-year streak of double-digit revenue growth.
• The Philadelphia Semiconductor Index fell 1.7 percent, paced by Intel, which lost 3.4 percent after revenue at its data-center business fell short of estimates.
• Starbucks Corp. slid 2 percent after reporting slower sales growth than analysts projected.
• The U.S. economy expanded at an annualized rate of 0.7 percent in the first quarter, the slowest pace in three years, as weak auto sales and lower home-heating bills dragged down consumer spending.

--With assistance from Todd White

To contact the reporter on this story: Lu Wang in New York at lwang8@bloomberg.net.

To contact the editors responsible for this story: Celeste Perri at cperri@bloomberg.net, Beth Mellor