S & P 500 near flat as healthcare in headlights

Traders working on the floor on the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) in New York, USA July 1, 2019. REUTERS / Brendan McDermid

July 11, 2019 [19659004] By Caroline Valetkevitch

NEW YORK (Reuters) – The S&P 500 was slightly changed in the afternoon trading on Thursday, with medical stocks mixed after the Trump administration withdrew a rule that would kill discounts.

Shares of the Pharmacy Beneficiary were obtained because the news meant that these companies would continue to benefit from after-market discounts from drug users. Health insurance companies and pharmaceutical distributors also rose.

A 5.3% profit in UnitedHealth Group Inc helped the Dow break over 27,000 points for the first time. Cigna Corp increased 9%. At the same time, drug manufacturers such as Merck & Co Inc and Pfizer Inc and Nasdaq biotech index <.NBI> fell 1

Inventory support was comments from the Federal Reserve chairman Jerome Powell, raising expectations for an interest rate cut.

Powell, on its first day of testimony to Congress on Wednesday, still confirmed the US economy's threats to disappointing factory activity, lower inflation and a simmering trade war, saying the Fed was ready to "act as appropriate". Powell testified before the Senate Bank Committee on Thursday.

S & P 500 rose above the 3,000 level for the first time on Wednesday after the news and hit a maximum of 3,002.33 on Thursday, but the index has managed to keep above that level.

"That the market has tried several times a week to get through it and keep has been a major psychological negative," said Michael James, CEO of stock trading at Wedbush Securities in Los Angeles.

Dow Jones Industrial Average <.DJI> rose 174.03 points, or 0.65% to 27.034.23, S & P 500 <.SPX> received 1.97 points or 0.07% to 2.995.04 and Nasdaq Composite <.IXIC> fell 13.86 points, or 0.17% to 8188.67.

Iron Mountain slumped after Bank of America Merrill Lynch downgraded the document repository shares to "underperforming", referring to recent declines in recycled paper price paper.

A report by the Ministry of Labor showed that US underlying consumer prices rose the most by nearly 1-1 / 2 years in June, but it was unlikely to change expectations that the Fed would cut prices this month.

Decreasing problems surpassed progress on the NYSE with a ratio of 1.19 to 1.

(Additional reporting from Medha Singh and Manas Mishra in Bengaluru; Editing of Shounak Dasgupta, Maju Samuel and Jonathan Oatis)