Stocks ended lower Friday on a weaker-than-expected reading on the nation’s economic growth and worries ahead of the upcoming Iraq election.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 40.20, or 0.4 percent, to 10,427.20. The Standard & Poor’s 500 index was down 3.19, or 0.3 percent, at 1,171.36. The Nasdaq Composite Index lost 11.32, or 0.6 percent, to 2,035.83.
The U.S. economy grew at a weaker-than-expected 3.1 percent annual pace in the final quarter of 2004. The Commerce Department’s latest gross domestic product figures showed the increase in fourth-quarter GDP was down from a 4 percent gain in the third quarter and was the weakest since a 1.9 percent pace in the first quarter of 2003.
Among local companies, shares of Hot Topic Inc. rose 1.7 percent to $18.92 after the City of Industry-based mall retailer’s stock was raised to “equal weight” from “underweight” by Pacific Growth Equities.
Shares of DreamWorks Animation SKG Inc. jumped 2.4 percent to $35.13 after the Glendale-based firm’s stock was upgraded to “overweight” from “neutral weight” by Prudential Equity Group Inc. Also, on Friday the company announced that it had been accepted as a sponsorship partner of the Westminster Kennel Club Dog Show the first time the show had accepted a partner that wasn’t a dog food company.
Hilton Hotels Corp. edged up 1 percent to close at $22.70 after it announced a decision to sell several of its owned properties with an eye toward balancing revenue streams.
On the other end of the scale, OSI Systems Inc. plunged 14 percent to $16.85 as investors reacted to its Thursday after-hours announcement of second-quarter earnings. For the second quarter ended Dec. 31, the Hawthorne-based company reported net income of $2.5 million (15 cents per diluted share), compared with $3 million (20 cents per share) for the like year-earlier quarter.
And Hanmi Financial Corp. dropped 1.4 percent to $34.91 the morning after it reported earnings for the quarter ended Dec. 31. The L.A.-based holding company for Hanmi Bank reported net income of $11.7 million (23 cents per diluted share), versus $5.1 million (18 cents per share) in the same period of 2003.
