NEW YORK, June 10 (Xinhua) -- U.S. stocks fluctuated for the week as investor sentiment was dominated by political uncertainties, including former FBI Director James Comey's testimony and Britain's election.
Comey on Thursday told Congress the contents of his interactions with U.S. President Donald Trump since election day, amid concerns that Trump tried to interfere with an ongoing probe on Russia.
Some analysts believed that congressional testimony given by Comey would likely not overly affect Trump's administration.
U.S. stocks have posted solid gains after Trump's election, as market expectations for tax reforms, deregulation and infrastructure spending were a key catalyst.
But turmoil in Washington triggered market concerns on whether the Trump administration could continue to push its reform agenda.
Investors also watched closely on the British general election. As British Prime Minister Theresa May gambled her political future on calling for a snap general election seven weeks ago, results from Thursday's election showed that her party can not form a majority government.
May confirmed Friday afternoon she will form a Westminster government, helped by members of Northern Ireland's Democratic Unionist Party.
Experts said the election is a significant blow for May as losing the majority will inevitably reduce her authority in a future government.
Meanwhile, the European Central Bank's (ECB) decision Thursday to keep its key interest rates unchanged was also in focus.
At the ECB governing council meeting, it was decided that the interest rate on the main refinancing operations and those on the marginal lending facility and the deposit facility will remain unchanged at 0.00 percent, 0.25 percent and -0.40 percent respectively.
The governing council expects the key ECB interest rates to well pass the horizon of the net asset purchases, said the ECB press release.
On the economic front, U.S. economic activity in the non-manufacturing sector grew in May for the 89th consecutive month, the Institute for Supply Management (ISM) said Monday.
The ISM's non-manufacturing index registered 56.9 percent in May, which is 0.6 percentage point lower than the April reading of 57.5 percent.
U.S. new orders for manufactured goods in April decreased 0.8 billion U.S. dollars or 0.2 percent to 469.0 billion dollars, in line with market consensus.
In the week ending June 3, the advance figure for seasonally adjusted initial claims was 245,000, a decrease of 10,000 from the previous week's revised level.
For the week, the blue-chip Dow rose 0.3 percent, and the broader S&P 500 fell 0.3 percent, while the tech-heavy Nasdaq tumbled 1.6 percent. Enditem
