Stocks Closed Lower on Mixed Economic Rports

U.S. stocks closed lower on Thursday, weighed by uncertainty about Friday’s nonfarm payrolls report and after a disappointing survey on the U.S. services sector. The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 61.98 points, or 0.47%, to 13,206.59. The S&P 500 fell 10.74 points, or 0.77%, to 1,391.57. The Nasdaq Composite lost 35.55 points, or 1.162%, to 3,024.30.

The Institute for Supply Management said its services-sector index fell to 53.5% from a reading of 56.0% in March.

Major retailers such as Costco and Macy’s reported on Thursday that April revenue rose less that 1 percent in the worst performance since 2009 when the U.S. economy was just coming out of a bad recession.

Facebook has set a price range of $28 to $35 for its initial public offering of stock. At the high end, this could raise as much as $11.8 billion. If the underwriters sell the extra stock reserved for overallotments, the IPO will value Facebook at $79.3 billion at the high end of the price range. That’s much higher than any other Internet IPO in the past, even Google Inc. in 2004.

LinkedIn Corp. (NYSE:LNKD) on Thursday reported a first-quarter profit of $5 million, or 4 cents a share. Revenue was $188.5 million, up from $93.9 million. Adjusted profit was 15 cents a share.