US STOCKS-Wall St dips on slowing job growth, U.S.-China tensions

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* U.S. economy added 1.76 mln jobs in July - report
* Congress to continue talks on coronavirus relief bill
* Trump moves to ban WeChat, TikTok, amps up friction with
Beijing
* Goldman Sachs inches lower as it restates profit
* Indexes off: Dow 0.44%, S&P 0.28%, Nasdaq 0.26%

(Updates to open)
By Sagarika Jaisinghani and Ambar Warrick
Aug 7 (Reuters) - The S&P 500 pulled back from near
six-month highs on Friday as data showed a sharp slowdown in
U.S. employment growth and President Donald Trump cranked up
friction with Beijing with moves to ban WeChat and TikTok.
The Labor Department's closely watched report showed nonfarm
payrolls increased by 1.76 million in July. While that was
better than the 1.6 million economists surveyed by Reuters had
forecast, it was still sharply lower than the record 4.8 million
in June. "Does today's number imply economic conditions are
significantly improved? No, it simply suggests the labor market
was static in July, showing no signs of renewed weakness that
the increase in COVID-19 cases had threatened," said Seema Shah,
chief strategist at Principal Global Investors in London.
Underlining the disconnect between U.S. economic health and
a stimulus-led rally on Wall Street, the Nasdaq closed Thursday
above 11,000 for the first time and the S&P 500 finished about
1% below its record high as traders counted on Congress to agree
on another coronavirus relief package.
However, Democrats and Trump's top aides have so far failed
to make substantial progress, with differences partly centered
around continuing an extra $600-per-week in unemployment
benefits. Meanwhile, Trump late on Thursday unveiled sweeping bans on
U.S. transactions with the Chinese owners of messaging app
WeChat and video-sharing app TikTok. In response, China said the
companies complied with U.S. laws and warned Washington would
have to "bear the consequences" of its action. Shares of WeChat-owner Tencent Holdings Ltd 0700.HK fell
as much as 10% in Asia trade, while New York-listed Tencent
Music Entertainment Group TME.N , which was spun off from
Tencent in 2018, fell 4.8% during U.S. hours.
Microsoft Corp MSFT.O , which is seeking to buy TikTok's
U.S. operations, was down 1%.
U.S.-listed Chinese stocks such as Baidu Inc BIDU.O ,
Alibaba Group Holding Ltd BABA.N and JD.com Inc JD.O fell
between 2.0% and 3.5%.
At 9:38 a.m. ET, the Dow Jones Industrial Average .DJI was
down 121.27 points, or 0.44%, at 27,265.71, the S&P 500 .SPX
was down 9.47 points, or 0.28%, at 3,339.69, and the Nasdaq
Composite .IXIC was down 29.32 points, or 0.26%, at 11,078.75.
With the second-quarter corporate earnings season largely
over, about 82% of S&P 500 companies that have reported so far
have beaten dramatically lowered estimates, with earnings on
average coming in 22.5% above expectations, the highest on
record.
Goldman Sachs Group Inc GS.N inched lower as it cut its
previously stated quarterly earnings, having set aside more
money to pay for its settlement with the Malaysian government
over the multi-billion-dollar 1MDB scandal. T-Mobile US Inc TMUS.O rose 7.8% as it added
more-than-expected monthly phone subscribers and said it had
overtaken rival AT&T Inc T.N as the second-largest U.S.
wireless provider. AT&T dipped 0.5%. Declining issues outnumbered advancers 2-to-1 on the NYSE
and 1.70-to-1 on the Nasdaq.
The S&P index recorded 14 new 52-week highs and no new low,
while the Nasdaq recorded 50 new highs and two new lows.