REFILE-US STOCKS-Banks, energy stocks drag Wall St lower; Biden's presser in focus

(Corrects typo in paragraph 14)
* Weekly jobless claims fall
* All eyes on Biden's press conference later in the day
* Nike skids on social media fallout over Xinjiang statement
* Indexes down: Dow 0.54%, S&P 0.35%, Nasdaq 0.35%

By Devik Jain
March 25 (Reuters) - Wall Street's main indexes fell on
Thursday, dragged down by economically sensitive bank and energy
stocks and shrugging off data showing the labor market continued
to limp out of a coronavirus-induced recession.
The Labor Department's weekly jobless claims report, the
most timely indicator of economic health, showed
fewer-than-expected Americans filed new claims for state
unemployment benefits last week. Ten of the 11 S&P sectors fell in early trading with energy
.SPNY , industrials .SPLRCI and financials .SPSY stocks,
which recently came into favor on recovery hopes, declining the
most.
"The entire market is sort of shortsighted, focused more on
the recent run and completely forgetting about the improving
outlook," said Robert Pavlik, senior portfolio manager at Dakota
Wealth in New York.
The technology-heavy Nasdaq Composite .IXIC has fallen in
March after four straight months of gains as rosy economic
projections lifted demand for undervalued cyclical stocks, but
also raised fears of higher inflation and a potential tax hike.
In testimonies to Congress this week, Federal Reserve Chair
Jerome Powell expressed optimism about a strong U.S. economic
rebound, while Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen said future tax
hikes will be needed to pay for public investments. President Joe Biden is expected to lay out a new goal for
U.S. vaccinations against COVID-19 at his first formal White
House news conference beginning at 1:15 p.m. ET (1715 GMT). Next
week, he is also set to unveil a multitrillion-dollar
infrastructure plan in Pittsburgh. "It's a tale of two different markets at this point and it
depends on what the market wants to focus on," said Faron Daugs,
founder and chief executive officer of Harrison Wallace
Financial Group.
"Does it want to focus on stimulus, increased vaccinations
and re-opening economies or on potential taxes, increased
regulation potentially in certain sectors, extremely high
spending and inflation."
Heavyweight tech stocks Facebook Inc FB.O , Google parent
Alphabet Inc GOOGL.O and Twitter Inc TWTR.N were subdued
ahead of their chief executives' testimony before Congress about
extremism and misinformation on their services. At 9:57 a.m. ET, the Dow Jones Industrial Average .DJI was
down 176.61 points, or 0.54%, at 32,243.45, the S&P 500 .SPX
was down 13.58 points, or 0.35%, at 3,875.56, and the Nasdaq
Composite .IXIC was down 45.37 points, or 0.35%, at 12,916.52.
Shares of Nike Inc NKE.N fell 4.8% as the sporting goods
giant faced a Chinese social media backlash over its comments
about reports of forced labor in Xinjiang. Darden Restaurants Inc DRI.N added 4.1% after it announced
new share buyback plan and forecast upbeat fourth-quarter
revenue and profit. Market participants also warned of higher volatility ahead
of the quarter-end portfolio rebalancing by institutional
investors.
Declining issues outnumbered advancers 3.75-to-1 on the NYSE
and 3.39-to-1 on the Nasdaq.
The S&P index recorded one new 52-week high and no new low,
while the Nasdaq recorded 11 new highs and 107 new lows.