NEW YORK (AP) — Stocks are falling in midday trading after the government reported surprisingly weak retail sales numbers.
The Commerce Department said Tuesday that retail sales rose for the seventh straight month in January. But the increase was the smallest since June. Retail sales rose just 0.3 percent, half of what economists had predicted.
The parent company of the New York Stock Exchange agreed to combine with the operator of the Frankfurt stock exchange, Deutsche Boerse AG, creating the world’s largest financial markets company. Shares of both companies fell after the deal was announced.
The Dow Jones industrial average fell 45, or 0.4 percent, to 12,222. The S&P 500 index fell 5, or 0.4 percent, to 1,327. The Nasdaq composite index fell 13, or 0.5 percent, at 2,804.
