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* Microsoft gains on upbeat cloud sales forecast
* PayPal, Tesla among top boosts on Nasdaq
* Twitter drops to seven-month low
* 3M drops on lowering profit outlook
* Dow down 0.29%, S&P 500 off 0.06%, Nasdaq up 0.31%
(Updates to open)
By Shreyashi Sanyal and Arjun Panchadar
Oct 24 (Reuters) - A rise in shares of Microsoft and PayPal
boosted the Nasdaq on Thursday, but poor earnings reports from
Twitter and 3M dragged down the S&P 500 and Dow Jones indexes,
taking the shine off what has been an upbeat earnings season so
Twitter Inc TWTR.N plunged about 18% to a seven-month low
after the social media platform posted disappointing quarterly
results. The wider communication services sector .SPLRCL fell 0.9%,
logging the biggest decline among the 11 major S&P 500 sectors.
Post-it notes maker 3M MMM.N dropped 5.16% and was on
course for its worst day in six months after lowering its
full-year profit forecast. The market is reacting to "micro volatility, which is driven
by individual company names, and macro calm around trade," said
Art Hogan, chief market strategist at National Securities in New
York.
Third-quarter earnings reports have taken center stage as
investors try to gauge the fallout from a drawn out U.S.-China
trade war, which has already shown up in the domestic economy.
The narrative so far has been fairly positive, with only a
small crop of companies including industrial giant Caterpillar
CAT.N , toymaker Hasbro Inc HAS.O and chipmaker Texas
Instruments TXN.O blaming the tariff moves for denting
results.
Of the 124 S&P 500 companies that reported results up to
Wednesday, more than 82% topped earnings estimates, according to
Refinitiv data. The S&P 500 index .SPX came within a hair's
breadth of its record high this week.
White House trade adviser Peter Navarro said on Thursday the
phase-one trade deal between Washington and Beijing would
include much of an agreement scrapped in May around intellectual
property. At 10:22 a.m. ET the Dow Jones Industrial Average .DJI was
down 77.95 points, or 0.29%, at 26,756.00, the S&P 500 .SPX
was down 1.87 points, or 0.06%, at 3,002.65.
The Nasdaq Composite .IXIC was up 25.06 points, or 0.31%,
at 8,144.85.
Tech giant Microsoft Corp MSFT.O gained 1.82% as its
outlook for cloud computing services surpassed analysts'
expectations, while PayPal Holdings Inc PYPL.O rose 7.73% on a
strong full-year earnings forecast. Lam Research Corp LRCX.O jumped 10.6%, boosting the
Philadelphia Semiconductor Index .SOX by 1.3% after the chip
equipment maker forecast strong results for the December
quarter. Dow Inc DOW.N gained 2% after the company exceeded profit
estimates, while electric car maker Tesla Inc TSLA.O surged
15.12% on a surprise quarterly profit. Other high profile companies including Amazon.com Inc
AMZN.O , Intel Corp INTC.O and Visa Inc V.N are slated to
report after markets close on Thursday.
Declining issues outnumbered advancers for a 1.12-to-1 ratio
on the NYSE and for a 1.26-to-1 ratio on the Nasdaq.
The S&P index recorded 25 new 52-week highs and three new
lows, while the Nasdaq recorded 45 new highs and 21 new lows.