Stocks Suffer a Late-Session Fade

Updated from 4:05 p.m. EDT

Stocks incurred mild losses Monday after a session marked by indecision gave way to uncertainty in the final hour of trade as the markets await a major economic and geopolitical milestone that's just more than a week away.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average lost 44.94 points, or 0.43%, to 10,371.47; the S&P 500 lost 4.70 points, or 0.41%, to 1130.42; while the Nasdaq fell 12.35 points, or 0.62% to 1974.38. The 10-year Treasury note was trading up 7/32 to yield 4.68%, while the dollar was lower against the yen and higher against the euro.

The Nasdaq managed to close above its 50-day moving average of 1973; the three major indices continue to remain above that technically significant level.

Volume stayed light, with just over 1.1 billion shares trading on the New York Stock Exchange, while nearly 1.4 billion changed hands on the Nasdaq. Decliners held about a 5-to-4 majority over advancers on both exchanges.

"For basically three weeks now, we've been stuck in a fairly tight trading range, and this decline here brings us down to the lower end of that range, but it doesn't break us out yet," said Ken Tower, chief market strategist with CyberTrader. "We seem to be in the grips of some uncertainty here, but I tend to think that the market will come to some conclusion about what's going to come out of the Fed's meeting before June 30, so I suspect that the market will find some direction before then."

With no major economic releases due out until Thursday, the market is widely considered to be in "wait-and-see" mode until next week's pivotal day -- June 30 -- when the Fed is expected to raise short-term interest rates and the U.S.-led coalition in Iraq will hand sovereignty over to the war-torn country's new government.