While you were sleeping: UPDATED Wall Street falls as jobs data disappoints

Wall Street dropped as worse than expected US economic data and disappointing earnings bolstered concern about the outlook for corporate profits.

An ADP national employment report showed US companies added 156,000 jobs in April, the smallest increase in three years, followed a revised 194,000 gain in the prior month.

"The job market appears to have stumbled in April," Pennsylvania-based Moody's Analytics chief economist Mark Zandi said. Moody's produces the figures with ADP.

"One month does not make a trend, but this bears close watching as the financial-market turmoil earlier in the year may have done some damage to business hiring."

Friday's government report is expected to show nonfarm jobs rose by 202,000 in April, while the unemployment rate will hold steady at 5%, according to a Reuters survey.

"I don't think the soft data is really going to concern the [Federal Reserve] as long as we see the jobs number in and around 200,000," New York-based Wunderlich Securities chief market strategist Art Hogan told Reuters.

Separately, a Commerce Department report showed the US trade deficit shrank more than expected in March, narrowing 13.9% to $US40.4 billion, as imports dropped the most in seven years.

"I think import growth will outpace export growth and therefore trade will continue to be a modest headwind to growth in the US," Jay Bryson, global economist at Wells Fargo Securities, in Charlotte, North Carolina, told Bloomberg.

Dow falls 100 points
Wall Street moved lower. At the close, the Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 99.65 points, or 0.6%, to 17,651.26, while the Nasdaq Composite Index fell 0.8% to 4725.64. The Standard & Poor's 500 Index shed 0.6% to 2051.12.

Declines in shares of Caterpillar and those of General Electric, 3.1% and 2.3% weaker respectively, led the Dow lower.

Shares of Priceline sank, trading 8.1% lower after the online travel services company offered a second-quarter earnings outlook that fell short of the mark.

Bucking the trend, shares of Time Warner gained, trading 1.5% higher after the company reported quarterly earnings that exceeded expectations.

"We expect the market to see some volatility going forward, with a downward bias as investors look for the next positive sign," New Jersey-based Stifel, Nicolaus & Co money manager Chad Morganlander told Bloomberg.

In Europe, the Stoxx 600 Index finished the day with a 1.1% decline from the previous close. Germany's DAX index eased 1%, France's CAC 40 index fell 1.1%, while the UK's FTSE 100 index dropped 1.2%.

(BusinessDesk)