After two days of solid gains and some fresh closing highs, stocks fell slightly in the final session of the week. The Dow Jones Industrials lost 133 points, the Nasdaq Composite fell 24, and the S&P 500 eased 9.
Oil futures fell modestly today. February crude lost 52 cents to settle at $59.04 a barrel.
A couple of “marine highway” project s will be getting federal funding from the Transportation Department’s Maritime Administration. One grant, more than $1 million, will be used to purchase six purpose-built barges and lease one towboat to support the growing Port Allen-to-New Orleans container shuttle. A $480,000 grant is intended to support the purchase or lease of facility and transportation equipment at a Baton Rouge facility that will be used to load and unload containers.
Not only did the U.S. economy add fewer jobs in December than had been expected – wages were disappointing, too. Pay was up just 2.9% from a year earlier; economists had forecast a gain of 3.1%. The Labor Department says the economy added 145,000 jobs last month.
