Wall Street starts week in red as technology underperforms

• Trade concerns reemerge on Monday.
• Apple suffers heavy losses to weigh on technology.

Major equity indexes in the United States started the week on a weak note amid resurfacing fears over a long-lasting trade conflict between the United States and China. For the first time in its 29-year history, Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) ended without a joint communique, which was taken as a sign toward an ongoing conflict.

"Pence, in a speech there, restated President Trump's threat to more than double tariffs on Chinese imports, and said the U.S. will not change course until China changes its ways," Washington Post reported on Monday. As of writing, the trade-sensitive S&P 500 Industrials Index was losing 0.4%.

Meanwhile, with the FAANG (Facebook, Amazon, Apple, Netflix, Google) shares losing between 1% and 3% in the first hour of trading weighed on the S&P 500 Technology Index, which was last seen down1.7% on the day. On the other hand, the so-called defensive sectors such as real estate and utilities record modest gains to help limit the losses for the time being. 

At the time of press, the Dow Jones Industrial Average was down 157.62 points, or 0.6%, at 25,255.20, the S&P 500 was down 17 points, or 0.62%, at 2,719.21 and the Nasdaq Composite was down 112.64 points, or 1.68%, at 6,751.95.