* Financial shares rise on hopes for bailout plan
* Coca-Cola, PepsiCo fall on broker downgrades
* Oil prices drag down energy shares
* Dow down 0.1 pct, Nasdaq down 0.2 pct; S&P up 0.2 pct
* For up-to-the-minute market news, click []
(Updates to late afternoon)
By Chuck Mikolajczak
NEW YORK, Feb 9 (Reuters) - The Dow industrials eased on
Monday as falling oil prices hurt energy shares and a brokerage
raised concerns about Coca-Cola and PepsiCo, blunting a rise in
financial stocks on hopes a bailout will spare shareholders.
Anxious traders awaited news of the government's bank
rescue plan after its announcement from Treasury Secretary
Timothy Geithner was postponed by one day until Tuesday.
At the same time, a $827 billion economic stimulus package
faced hurdles in the Senate. A version of the package has
already been approved in the House of Representatives, without
a single Republican vote.
"Everyone's waiting for Geithner tomorrow," said Steven
Masocca, managing director at Wedbush Morgan in San Francisco.
"Expectations are raised or as high as they can be -- it may be
a bit anti-climatic because a lot of the details have already
leaked out."
The Dow Jones industrial average <> fell 9.72 points,
or 0.12 percent, to 8,270.87. The Standard & Poor's 500 Index
<.SPX> added 1.29 points, or 0.15 percent, to 869.89. The
Nasdaq Composite Index <> slipped 0.15 points, or 0.01
percent, to 1,591.56.
Uncertainty regarding the bank rescue has shaken financial
shares, pushing them down nearly 21 percent year-to-date on
fears that the government would be forced to nationalize some
banks. Those fears have now been easing on expectations the
Obama administration's rescue plan will focus on getting
private investors to buy up bad debts.
Even though the the S&P financial index <.GSPF> rose 1.3
percent on Monday, the ability of the sector as a whole to
impact the market has been greatly diminished because flagging
stock prices of financial companies have cut their market caps,
reducing their weight on the overall market.
Regional banks were a standout, with Huntington Bancshares
<HBAN.O> up nearly 11 percent to $2.61 while Regions Financial
<RF.N> jumped over 10 percent to $4.64.
Shares of leading soft drink makers Coca-Cola Co <KO.N> and
PepsiCo <PEP.N> fell after broker downgrades and reductions on
the companies' share price targets.
Further pressuring Coke was news that Australasian brewer
Lion Nathan Ltd <LNN.AX> dropped a $4.9 billion bid for
Australian soft drinks company Coca-Cola Amatil Ltd <CCL.AX>,
whose main shareholder is Coca-Cola Co, after talks between the
two companies broke down over conditions. For details, see
[]
Coca-Cola dropped 2.9 percent to $42.06, making it the
biggest weight on the Dow, while PepsiCo slid 3.9 percent to
$51.43.
Oil prices fell below $40 a barrel in a late sell-off on
Monday, dragging ExxonMobil <XOM.N> down 1.1 percent to
$79.48.
General Electric <GE.N was one of the positive performers
among blue-chips, adding 13.9 percent to $12.64 on hopes its
financial arm, General Electric Capital Corp will benefit from
the bank bailout. The advance pushed the S&P Industrial index
<> up 2.6 percent, making it the best-performing sector in
the S&P 500. GE shares rose for a second straight day after six
consecutive sessions of declines.
On Nasdaq, shares of Apple <AAPL.O> rose 2.8 percent to
$102.51 after a broker upgrade, countering a decline in
Microsoft <MSFT.O>, which fell on some profit taking following
last week's advance. Microsoft shares slid 1.1 percent to
$19.44 after gaining more than 14 percent the previous week.
Also on the down side, shares of NYSE Euronext <NYX.N>,
operator of the New York Stock Exchange, fell 5.2 percent to
$21.71 after it reported a quarterly loss as it took a $1.59
billion charge to write down the value of its trans-Atlantic
merger. []
(Editing by Leslie Adler)
