A sharp drop in January housing starts weighed the markets down during the midday with the Dow losing 39 points to 16,090. Nasdaq fell 20 points to 4252.
On the upside
Nabors Industries (NYSE: NBR) reported sharply higher fourth quarter earnings as revenue edged up.
Garmin (Nasdaq: GRMN) reported higher fourth quarter earnings that surpassed analyst expectations by a wide margin and increased its dividend.
Arrowhead Research (Nasdaq: ARWR) priced its offering of 5.5 million common shares at the discounted price of $18.95 per share but the stock price climbed.
On the downside
Profit taking weighed down shares of Prana Biotechnology (Nasdaq: PRAN).
Genco Shipping (NYSE: GNK) failed to make a $3.1 million interest payment and retained the services of Blackstone Advisory Partners to review its options.
Navios Maritime (NYSE: NM) widened fourth quarter losses more than expected.
In the broad market, declining issues outpaced advancers by a margin of more than 10 to 9 on the NYSE and by nearly 2 to 1 on Nasdaq. The broader S&P 500 slipped 5 points to 1835. Bitcoin edged up $0.58 or 0.22% to $261.23.
