NEW YORK (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 04th January, 2020) Share prices on Wall Street closed lower, retreating from their record high opening for 2020 after a US airstrike killed a top Iranian general in Iraq, raising fears of retaliation against the United States.
Wall Street's top stocks barometer, the S&P500, closed down 0.6 percent at 3,237 on Friday. The index, which measures the value of the 500 largest US corporations by market capitalization, settled on Thursday at an all-time high of 3,257.
The technology-heavy Nasdaq Composite Index closed down 0.8 percent at 9,021. The Nasdaq hit a record high of 9,093 in the previous session, rising its most in a day since September 5. The technology sector was the darling of Wall Street investors last year, lifting the Nasdaq by 36 percent for the index's best performance in six years.
US stocks' broad Dow Jones Industrial Average also slid by 0.8 percent to close at 28,635. The Dow hit an all-time high of 28,873 on Thursday, in its best one-day gain since December 6. The Dow rose 23 percent last year for its best performance since 2017.
The US drone attack near Baghdad airport killed Qassem Soleimani, the commander who led Iran's Revolutionary Guards' Quds force. US President Donald Trump said Washington took preemptive action against Soleimani to "stop a war". An advisor to Iranian President Hassan Rouhani, however, said the United States crossed a "red line" with the attack and Iran's supreme leader Ali Khamenei warned that a "harsh retaliation is waiting" for the United States.
