The equities markets in New York were mixed without moving much of anywhere by the middle of the afternoon on Monday. The Dow Jones Industrial Average was up 0.2 percent to 10,762.97. The Nasdaq Composite was also up 0.2 percent to 2,041.49, while the S&P 500 was barely down, just 0.24 points, to 1,235.96. While investors were still concerned about the ongoing unrest in the Middle East, there was some positive data to provide a counterpoint. The Federal Reserve said that industrial output was up in June more than had been expected, with capacity utilization at 82.4 percent. That was the highest it has been since June 2000.
A drop in the price of crude oil sent oil and related stocks down. ConocoPhillips fell 3.3 percent to $65.21, while Halliburton dropped 4.6 percent to $35.12.
Miners were lower as well as the price of copper dropped. Phelps Dodge was down 3.9 percent to $76.71 and Freeport McMoran declined by 4.9 percent to $51.75.
Mattel added 11.6 percent to $17.72 after the toymaker reported that it made a profit in the second quarter, mostly on the sale of toys linked to new movie releases.
In the banking sector, Citigroup dropped 2.4 percent to $46.46. It’s second-quarter report showed that profits were up 4 percent. That was only a bit lower than analysts had predicted, but it was enough for Prudential to downgrade the banker from “overweight” to “neutral weight”.