U.S. stock indexes fell on Monday on growing concerns that the Federal Reserve will continue to raise interest rates after Friday’s jobs data pointed to a resilient labor market.
The tech-heavy Nasdaq led losses among the major indexes after the long weekend, with growth stocks including Apple Inc., Amazon.com Inc., and Microsoft Corp. slipping between 1.7 percent and 2.1 percent.
U.S. employers maintained a strong pace of hiring in March, data on Friday showed, pushing the unemployment rate down to 3.5 percent and raising odds of the Fed hiking rates one more time next month.
“Investors remain very optimistic that the (rate) increases will come to an end, but the data which the Fed is so dependent on seems to leave room for at least a 25-basis point increase one more time,” said Rick Meckler, partner at Cherry Lane Investments….