* Investors looking ahead to Fed meeting, midterms
* VIX rises as investors grow cautious
* Microsoft rises after profit tops view
* Dow up 0.04 pct, S&P off 0.04 pct, Nasdaq flat
* For up-to-the-minute market news see []
(Updates to close, changes byline)
By Chuck Mikolajczak
NEW YORK, Oct 29 (Reuters) - U.S. stocks ended on a flat
note on Friday, wrapping up another strong month driven by
expectations the Federal Reserve will flood the economy with
cash next week.
Investors kept trading to a minimum this week in
anticipation of next Wednesday's announcement. Activity the
last several weeks has been heavily influenced by hopes for a
large round of asset buying.
While earnings have largely taken a back seat to
macroeconomic data, Microsoft Corp's <MSFT.O> stock rose 1.5
percent to $$26.67 a day after its profit beat estimates on
higher sales of its flagship software. []
Investors are betting on volatility to rise after
Wednesday's announcement and have been hedging against
unexpected outcomes from the Fed meeting, as well as Tuesday's
midterm elections. The CBOE Volatility Index <.VIX> climbed
about 13 percent this week, even as stocks rose marginally.
"There's no getting around how big of a week next week is,
and it could be an inflection point either up or down," said
Max Bublitz, chief investment strategist at SCM Advisors in
San Francisco.
The midterm elections have also garnered investor
attention, with polls indicating a Republican takeover of the
U.S. House of Representatives. For details, see []
On the downside, Dow components Chevron Corp <CVX.N> and
Merck & Co <MRK.N>, fell after posting quarterly results.
Chevron fell 2.2 percent to $82.61 on a weaker-than-expected
profit, while Merck lost 1.8 percent to $$36.28 after its
sales disappointed investors. [] []
The Dow Jones industrial average <> added 4.54 points,
or 0.04 percent, to 11,118.49. The Standard & Poor's 500 Index
<.SPX> shed just 0.52 of a point, or 0.04 percent, to
1,183.26. The Nasdaq Composite Index <> edged up just
0.04 point, or 0.00 percent, to 2,507.41.
For the week, the Dow dipped 0.1 percent while the S&P 500
edged up only 0.02 percent and the Nasdaq added 1.1 percent.
A HEALTHY OCTOBER
For the month of October, though, it was a solid upswing,
with the S&P 500 gaining 3.7 percent, while the Dow advanced
3.1 percent and the Nasdaq jumped 5.9 percent.
U.S. economic growth edged up as predicted in the third
quarter, but not enough to chip away at high unemployment or
change expectations of more monetary easing from the Federal
Reserve next week. []
In another snapshot of the economy, the Thomson
Reuters/University of Michigan's survey showed that consumer
sentiment weakened slightly in October, dropping to its lowest
level in almost a year. []
The week of Nov. 1 marks the final peak week of the
third-quarter earnings season, as 94 S&P 500 companies and two
Dow components are expected to report.
With 335 S&P 500 companies having reported so far, some 77
percent have beaten earnings estimates. That is just shy of
the record beat rate of 79 percent in the third quarter of
2009, according to Thomson Reuters data.
Volume was light, with about 6.9 billion shares traded on
the New York Stock Exchange, the American Stock Exchange and
Nasdaq, below the year-to-date daily average of 8.73 billion.
Advancing stocks outnumbered declining ones on the NYSE by
a ratio of 17 to 11, while on the Nasdaq, seven stocks rose
for nearly every six that fell.
(Reporting by Chuck Mikolajczak, Additional reporting by Ryan
Vlastelica and Caroline Valetkevitch; Editing by Jan Paschal)
