Stocks were slightly lower on Monday as market benchmarks hovered around record highs ahead of fresh inflation data due out later this week. The Dow Jones Industrial Average slipped over 60 points, while the S&P 500 Index and Nasdaq Composite lost about 0.4% and 0.1%, respectively.
Here's how the market settled on Monday:
S&P 500 Index (NYSE: SPY): -0.38% or -19.27 points to 5,069.53
Dow Jones Industrial Average (NYSE: DIA): -0.16% or -62.30 points to 39,069.23
Nasdaq Composite Index (NASDAQ: QQQ): -0.13% or -20.57 points to 15,976.25
In the News: Amazon (NASDAQ: AMZN) joined the Dow Jones Industrial Average on Monday, replacing Walgreens Boots Alliance (NASDAQ: WBA) as the index increases its exposure to technology to reflect the "evolving nature of the American economy," accord to the S&P Dow Jones Indices.
Moreover, Uber Technologies (NYSE: UBER) has replaced JetBlue Airways (NASDAQ: JBLU) on the 30-stock index, to "help the index gain exposure to the ride sharing industry."
Separately, the U.S. Federal Trade Commission (FTC) on Monday sued to blow Kroger's (NYSE: KR) $24.6 billion acquisition of Albertsons (NYSE: ACI), arguing that the combined grocery company would impact consumer prices and worker wages.
"Kroger's acquisition of Albertsons would lead to additional grocery price hikes for everyday goods, further exacerbating the financial strain consumers across the country face today," Henry Liu, director of the FTC's Bureau of Competition, said in a statement. "Essential grocery store workers would also suffer under this deal, facing the threat of their wages dwindling, benefits diminishing, and their working conditions deteriorating."
Kroger said in a statement: "The FTC's decision makes it more likely that America's consumers will see higher food prices and fewer grocery stores at a time when communities across the country are already facing high inflation and food deserts."
Elsewhere, Google (NASDAQ: GOOG) (NASDAQ: GOOGL) announced Monday it plans to relaunch its Gemini AI picture generator soon after the company pulled the tool on Thursday following a string of backlash from users.
"We have taken the feature offline while we fix that," Google DeepMind CEO Demis Hassabis said Monday during a panel at the Mobile World Congress conference in Barcelona, quoted by CNBC. "We are hoping to have that back online very shortly in the next couple of weeks," adding that the product was not "working the way we intended."
On the Economic Front: Sales of new single-family homes in the United States increased by a less-than-expected rate in January as high mortgage rates continue to price some would-be home buyers out of the market.
New home sales rose 1.5% to a seasonally adjusted total 661,000 last month, the Census Department reported Monday, missing estimates for a total of 680,000. Meanwhile, the median sales price was $420,700 while the average price was $534,300 in January.
For Tuesday: Market participants will react to economic data including January's durable good orders, December's S&P Case-Shiller home price index reading, and February's consumer confidence print. Key earnings reports also include companies like Zoom Video Communications (NASDAQ: ZM), Unity Software (NYSE: U) and Lowe's Companies (NYSE: LOW).