NEW YORK — U.S. stocks fell Friday after an adverse foreclosure ruling hit bank shares hard, but major indexes ended the first week of trading in the new year higher.
The Dow Jones industrial average dropped 22.55 points, or 0.2 percent, to end at 11,674.76. For the week, the Dow ended up 0.9 percent, notching its sixth weekly gain.
The Nasdaq composite fell 0.3 percent to end at 2,703.17. The Nasdaq was up 1.9 percent for the week. The Standard & Poor’s 500 index fell 0.2 percent to 1,271.50. But the index logged a gain of 1.1 percent for the week.
Much of the week’s gains were made Monday and Wednesday, with Monday’s rally coming on optimism for the new year, while Wednesday’s climb followed a stronger-than-expected report on private-sector jobs for December.
But investors were disappointed Friday by monthly employment data showing nonfarm payrolls rose by 103,000 last month as private-sector employers added 113,000 jobs, missing economists’ estimate for a gain of 150,000 jobs.
The Dow’s financial components led Friday’s decline, with JPMorgan Chase & Co. slipping 1.9 percent and Bank of America Corp. falling 0.8 percent. Weighing on the banks, the Massachusetts State Supreme Judicial Court upheld a decision that two foreclosures from U.S. Bancorp and Wells Fargo & Co. were invalid because the banks failed to show they held the mortgages at the time of the foreclosure.
“That takes you back into the maelstrom of who is the valid holder of the mortgage, who owns the property and will this slow the rate at which the banks can process the foreclosures,” said Joseph Battipaglia, chief market strategist of the private client group at Stifel Nicolaus.
U.S. Bancorp dropped 0.8 percent, and Wells Fargo declined 2 percent. Neither stock is in the Dow.
Investors fretted over how the ruling could influence similar cases for other banks. Among the other bank stocks that fell, Regions Financial Corp. shares dropped 1.7 percent, and BB&T Corp. declined 2 percent.
