Stocks drop as investors sweat rate hikes

STORY: Stocks dropped on Friday, dragging all three main indexes to their biggest weekly decline so far this year.

Data showing U.S. economic resilience signaled for investors the U.S. Federal Reserve would likely continue its pace of rate hikes, raising borrowing costs and sending many to press the sell button.

The Dow lost one percent, the Nasdaq fell closer to two percent, and the S&P 500 declined close to one percent.

After a strong performance in January, stocks have retreated this month as a slew of economic data amplified worries that the U.S. central bank might have to keep rates higher for longer.

A Friday report showed consumer spending last month rose at its fastest pace in nearly two years, while an inflation measure closely watched by the Fed also climbed.

Melissa Brown, managing director of applied research at Qontigo warned that more aggressive action from the Fed to curb rising prices could raise the risks of a recession.

“Instead of an increase in in rates of 25 basis points, there's a higher probability that that interest rate increase is going to be 50 basis points and the higher the increase that we see in interest rates, the more likely it is that we will actually tip into a recession. And I think that's the major concern that we're seeing today.”

Some of the biggest drags on the market though were unrelated to the broader economic picture:

Boeing slid five percent after the Federal Aviation Administration said the plane maker temporarily halted deliveries of its 787 Dreamliner jets.

Adobe slumped about eight percent on reports the U.S. Justice Department would block the Photoshop maker's $20 billion bid for cloud-based designer platform Figma.

One stock moving in the other direction was Beyond Meat, which surged 10 percent as the plant-based meat maker's results indicated that its cost-control measures were finally bearing fruit.