Stocks drift amid rate concerns ahead of jobs report

Wall Street drifted through a quiet day of trading Monday, ahead of economic reports this week that could drive where interest rates go.

- BY STAN CHOE

The Standard & Poor's 500 slipped 10.90 points, or 0.2%, to 6,816.51 though the majority of stocks within the index rose. The Dow Jones industrial average dipped 41.49 points, or 0.1%, to 48,416.56, and the Nasdaq composite fell 137.76 points, or 0.6%, to 23,057.41. Helping to keep indexes in check were stocks in the artificial intelligence industry, which were mixed after last week's scary swings.

Nvidia, the chip company that’s become the face of the AI boom, added 0.7%. It was one of the strongest forces pushing upward on the S&P 500 after dropping 4.1% last week.

But Oracle sank an additional 2.7% after its 12.7% tumble last week, which was its worst in more than seven years. Broadcom fell 5.6%.

AI stocks have been shaky on worries that the billions of dollars flowing into chips and data centers may not produce a big enough payoff to make it worthwhile. The doubts are causing cracks for the industry, whose earlier surges were the main driver for the U.S. market's rally to records.

Besides AI, the main focus on Wall Street this week will be on what several big updates on the U.S. economy’s health say.