Stocks lose steam, closing lower for the second day in a row

Stocks (^DJI, ^IXIC, ^GSPC) waver ahead of Tuesday's closing bell to end the day lower. This is the second consecutive day of market losses in the final trading week of 2024's first quarter.

Yahoo Finance's Josh Lipton reviews how the major indices ended the trading day, while Jared Blikre monitors sector leaders and standout tickers, such as United Parcel Service (UPS) shares and the Grayscale Bitcoin Trust ETF (GBTC).

For more expert insight and the latest market action, click here to watch this full episode of Yahoo Finance Live.

Editor's note: This article was written by Luke Carberry Mogan.

Video transcript

JOSH LIPTON: Let's see where the major averages ended. So we were modestly higher. And now, we're kind of ticking down.

Call it modestly lower here. You can see the Dow is basically finishing relatively flat here. The tech heavy NASDAQ is down about 4/10 of a percent.

Meanwhile, the S&P 500, it's down about it 3/10 of a percent. Of course, we're coming off a very strong week modestly lower here. We also traders are aware they have a big economic data point coming on Friday.

That's the Fed's preferred inflation gauge. Remember, markets will be closed here. Regardless, listen, maybe some modest losses today.

The S&P 500, still what a run on track for five consecutive months of gains. Jared, over you for a closer look at today's sector action.

JOSH SCHAFER: Thank you, Josh. You can't win them all. But we could win a few sectors here. You can see behind me health care managing to finish in the green. It's leading the way. Followed by financials, consumer discretionary and staples.

Remember, I just said over the last five months, financials is actually one of the top performing sectors along with tech. But today, we're seeing utilities that is a worst performer. That's down over 1% followed by energy, real estate. Then you get into tech and industrialises bottom row all out or all underperforming, I should say.

And also taking a look at some of our leaders. It was really a day about cannabis. We've seen a very volatile price action.

And that happened to be lagging yesterday leading to the downside. Today, it's leading to the upside. But for the most part, not seeing a whole lot of winners here. In fact, the biggest loser I have on my leaderboard is Bitcoin. That is down another 2% Josh.