Wall St mixed with focus on more data, Fed commentary

By Shashwat Chauhan and Purvi Agarwal

(Reuters) - Wall Street's main indexes were subdued in volatile trading on Tuesday after the S&P 500 and the Nasdaq notched record high levels in the previous session, with focus on a crucial jobs report later this week and commentary from Federal Reserve officials.

The hotly anticipated monthly payrolls figures on Friday, a crucial metric in gauging the Fed's interest rate trajectory, are on top of investors' radar.

A November reading of private payrolls is also due on Wednesday.

Meanwhile, a Labor Department report showed U.S. job openings increased moderately in October while layoffs declined, suggesting the labor market continued to slow in an orderly fashion.

At 11:36 a.m. ET, the Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 169.17 points, or 0.37%, to 44,615.46, the S&P 500 lost 6.98 points, or 0.11%, to 6,040.22 and the Nasdaq Composite gained 22.13 points, or 0.12%, to 19,427.37, briefly hitting an all-time high.

Seven of the 11 major S&P sub-sectors were trading lower, with industrials' 0.9% fall leading losses.

On the docket for Tuesday, comments from Chicago Fed President Austan Goolsbee and Fed Board Governor Adriana Kugler would be parsed through.

Fed Governor Christopher Waller said on Monday he is inclined "at present" to support another interest rate cut later this month, while New York Fed President John Williams could not yet say what the central bank's next move will be.

The Nasdaq and the S&P 500 hit record closing highs in the last session, as the tech rally spilled into December after U.S. equities' stellar November performance.

"A lot of people are saying, look, don't fight the trend. There's a lot of momentum and people are looking for reasons to be optimistic," said Patrick Kaser, portfolio manager at Brandywine Global.

"The flip side of that is at some point everybody's expecting good things and evaluations are not supportive of anything other than this good scenario, so there will come a time when the good news starts to mean too much good news."

Former U.S. President Donald Trump recaptured the White House in last month's election and his Republican Party swept both houses of Congress, boosting stocks in November.

Analysts have cited Trump's potential plans for tax cuts and deregulation as a positive for stocks, though tariffs could be a negative on concerns of fresh inflationary pressures and a global trade war.

U.S.-listed shares of South Korean companies lost ground with iShares MSCI South Korea ETF down 3%, after President Yoon Suk Yeol declared martial law in the country.

Tesla (NASDAQ:TSLA ) slipped 1.5% after data showed the automaker's sales of China-made electric vehicles fell 4.3% year-on-year to 78,856 in November.

Zscaler (NASDAQ:ZS ) dropped 5.7% after analysts noted that the cybersecurity firm's second-quarter revenue forecast failed to impress.

U.S. Steel shed 7.9% after Trump reiterated his opposition to Nippon Steel's planned $15 billion the purchase of the company.



Declining issues outnumbered advancers by a 1.62-to-1 ratio on the NYSE and by a 1.89-to-1 ratio on the Nasdaq.

The S&P 500 posted 20 new 52-week highs and two new lows, while the Nasdaq Composite recorded 82 new highs and 68 new lows.

Source: Investing.com