Stocks started the week with losses amid rising Treasury yields, while traders awaited earnings releases from several large technology companies. Oil and gold retreated as Israel appeared to refrain from a larger ground invasion of the Gaza Strip.

The S&P 500 index fell for the fifth straight session, approaching its longest losing streak this year. The index breached the key 4,200 mark, which represents a 50 per cent retracement of the rally from the lows reached during the banking turmoil in March. Wall Street’s so-called “fear indicator,” the VIX index, remained at a seven-month high. The 10-year Treasury bond yield hit 5 per cent for the first time since 2007 before retreating from that level. The dollar fluctuated.

The data show that about one-fifth of the S&P 500 reported, and stocks of companies that lagged analysts’ earnings-per-share forecasts outperformed the benchmark index by an average of 3.7 per cent on the day the results were released. That’s the worst performance in the history of the data since the second quarter of 2019.