Leading Wall Street shares fell back in early deals as investors locked in gains from the week's rally despite a better than expected reading on consumer confidence. By mid-morning, the Dow Jones was down 45.93 points to 9,745.79 and the Nasdaq was 28.56 points under at 1,921.58. The University of Michigan's consumer sentiment index for October, a closely watched measure of consumer confidence in the US, revealed that US consumers are prepared to spend more in the near future amid expectations of a full economic recovery. The index rose to 89.4 from 87.7 in September, according to market sources quoted by . Economists, on average, expected a reading of 88.2.
Despite the news, profit taking was the main feature of the day's trading so far with some weak tech sector earnings adding to the negative sentiment. Networks giant, Sun Microsystems, dropped 2.6pc after it reported a quarterly net loss of 9 cents per share, versus a year-ago net loss of 4 cents per share. Analysts had expected a loss of 8 cents per share. //www.fxcentre.com