The US markets made a modestly lower closing on Friday after showing lackluster performance throughout the trading session, mainly due to a steep drop by the price of crude oil, which pulled back further off its recent highs. Traders also digesting the latest batch of US economic data, including an industrial production report from the Federal Reserve showing a much bigger than expected drop in industrial production in March. The industrial production fell by 0.6 percent in March, matching the downwardly revised drop reported for February. The bigger than expected decrease was primarily due to steep drops in mining and utilities output, although manufacturing output also fell 0.3 percent.
Also a report from the University of Michigan showed an unexpected deterioration in consumer sentiment in the month of April. The preliminary reading on the consumer sentiment index for April came in at 89.7 compared to the final March reading of 91.0. However, traders largely shrugged off a report from the New York Fed showing a faster than expected expansion in regional manufacturing activity in April.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average declined by 28.97 points or 0.16 percent to 17,897.46, the Nasdaq lost 7.67 points or 0.16 percent to 4,938.22 and the S&P 500 ended lower by 2.05 points or 0.10 percent to 2,080.73.
The Indian ADRs mostly in green on Friday, HDFC Bank was up by 0.28%, ICICI Bank was up by 0.06%, Infy surged by 1.55%, Tata Motors gained 0.18% and Wipro was up by 0.24%.