NEW YORK — Another lackluster economic report sent stocks down Wednesday, extending a week-long slide.
The Federal Reserve report, known as the Beige Book, showed the economy slowed in several U.S. regions for the first time this year. While seven of the Fed’s 12 districts reported steady gains, the economy stalled in the New York, Philadelphia, Atlanta and Chicago regions, the Fed said. Dallas was the only region to report accelerated growth — largely because of the effect of higher oil prices on the region’s energy industry.
The report added to concerns that have been building since mid-April that the American economy is stalling. High oil prices, bad weather and supply-chain problems following the tsunami and nuclear disaster in Japan have combined to dampen many investors’ outlook for the rest of the year. And Tuesday, Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke acknowledged that the U.S. economic recovery was “uneven” and “frustratingly slow,” though he added that he expected growth to pick up in the second half of the year.
That has left many investors on edge.
“What Bernanke basically said was that we have to believe we’re in a soft patch that will pass by itself,” said Randall Warren, chief investment officer at Warren Financial Services. “That takes a lot of faith.”
The Dow Jones industrial average on Wednesday fell 21.87, or 0.2 percent, to 12,048.94. The Standard and Poor’s 500 lost 5.38, or 0.4 percent, to 1,279.56 — marking its sixth straight loss. The Nasdaq composite slipped 26.18, or 1 percent, to 2,675.38.
Energy companies were among the few stocks to gain broadly. Oil companies such as Exxon Mobil, which gained 1 percent, rose after oil settled above $100 a barrel.
The Fed’s Beige Book also noted that manufacturing “continued to expand in most parts of the country” while slowing in some areas. Consumer spending was “mixed,” it said, while the job market improved “gradually across most of the nation.”
