Wall Street Ticks Lower

On the Dow, Wal-Mart and Hewlett-Packard are among the early decliners. Crude oil prices are slightly higher in New York, and Treasury securities are losing ground.
By Sarina Penn ,

Updated from 8:04 a.m. EDT

Wall Street was in a holding pattern at the open Tuesday as investors digested better-than-expected retail sales data alongside a cautious outlook at

Wal-Mart

(WMT) - Get Report

, the world's biggest merchandiser.

The

Dow Jones Industrial Average

was down 17 points to 12,860, and the

S&P 500

was off half a point at 1403. The

Nasdaq Composite

lost 2 points to 2486.

Before the opening bell, the Commerce Department reported that retail sales, excluding cars, swelled by 0.5% in April, compared with the 0.2% economists' consensus. March data were revised upward to 0.4%. Keeping in the effects of declining auto sales, the numbers showed a drop of 0.2%, as expected.

On the other hand, Wal-Mart's current-quarter outlook leaned to the lower end of expectations, even as its first-quarter profit grew by 6.9% to a better-than-expected $3.02 billion, or 76 cents a share. Shares of the Dow component dropped 1.2%.

Meanwhile,

Hewlett-Packard

(HPQ) - Get Report

confirmed that it will acquire

Electronic Data Systems

(EDS)

. H-P said it will pay $13.9 billion in cash, or $25 a share, nearly a billion higher than the top end of the range cited by news reports yesterday. H-P shares slipped 4.9% as EDS -- which surged in the prior session -- climbed another 1.5%.

As for research calls, Oppenheimer cut its second-quarter, fiscal 2008 and fiscal 2009 earnings estimates on

Goldman Sachs

(GS) - Get Report

,

Merrill Lynch

(MER)

,

Lehman Brothers

(LEH)

and

Morgan Stanley

(MS) - Get Report

, in part because of expected revenue reversals that will be required by a new accounting treatment.

Back on the economic docket, the Labor Department said import prices, excluding the volatile effects of oil, were up 1.1% in April -- the same as the prior month. Stripping out agricultural products, export prices ticked up 0.6%, or less than half the growth seen in March.

Among commodities, crude oil rose 35 cents to $124.58 a barrel, and gold futures fell $13 to $871.90 an ounce. The U.S. dollar firmed by 0.7% against the euro at $1.5436, and the greenback added 0.8% against the yen to 104.70.

Treasury prices were sliding. The 10-year note was off 17/32 in price to yield 3.87%, and the 30-year bond shed 24/32 in price, yielding 4.58%.

Foreign markets were mainly higher. In Asia, Tokyo's Nikkei 225 ramped up 1.5% overnight, and Hong Kong's Hang Seng Index leaped 2%. As for Europe, Germany's Xetra Dax rose 0.6% and the Paris Cac tacked on 0.7%. London's FTSE 100 was virtually flat at 6221.

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