Dec 4 (Reuters) - U.S. stocks closed near the unchanged mark on Thursday, as investors weighed a report on the labor market and other economic data, while equities drew support from elevated hopes for a Federal Reserve interest-rate cut next week.
A 1.4% drop in Amazon.com shares weighed on the S&P 500, limiting its advance.
With the November payrolls report scheduled for after the Fed's December meeting due to the extended government shutdown, market participants have looked to secondary indicators that have given a mixed view of the labor market as the backlog of government data slowly gets unwound.
A Labor Department report showed initial jobless claims dropped to their lowest level in more than three years, although analysts suggested the drop could have been in part due to the Thanksgiving holiday.
A separate report from the Chicago Fed estimated the unemployment rate held near 4.4% in November.
Markets are pricing in an 87% chance the central bank will cut rates by 25 basis points this month, up from a 68.6% chance priced in a month ago, according to CME's FedWatch Tool, opens new tab.
"Everybody's waiting around to see what the Fed thinks with any of this data that they've seen come in because the last comments from (Fed Chair Jerome) Powell were a little bit on the hawkish side, but cuts are fully expected," said Mike Dickson, head of research and quantitative strategies at Horizon Investments in Charlotte, North Carolina.
"The short of it is the gold standard is payrolls, and we just don't have an updated figure there, so that's going to really move the needle one way or the other on any future rate policy paths."
The Dow Jones Industrial Average (.DJI), fell 31.96 points, or 0.07%, to 47,850.94, the S&P 500 (.SPX), gained 7.40 points, or 0.11%, to 6,857.12 and the Nasdaq Composite (.IXIC), gained 51.04 points, or 0.22%, to 23,505.14.
A delayed report from the Commerce Department showed factory orders rose 0.2%, short of the 0.5% estimate, after a downwardly revised 1.3% increase in August as tariffs hemmed in manufacturers.
Dow component Salesforce (CRM.N), climbed 3.7% after the company raised its fiscal 2026 revenue and adjusted profit forecasts, anticipating growth in its artificial intelligence agent platform due to strong enterprise demand.
Also on the plus side, Meta Platforms (META.O), rose 3.4% as one of the biggest boosts to the S&P after a Bloomberg report said the Facebook parent planned cuts of up to 30% of its Metaverse budget.
Meanwhile, Amazon (AMZN.O), dipped as one of the biggest drags to the benchmark S&P index after the e-commerce company said it was in discussions with the U.S. Postal Service about their future relationship and is considering its options before its contract expires next year.
The consumer staples index (.SPLRCS), was one of the worst-performing of the 11 major S&P sectors, pressured by a 4.6% drop in Kroger (KR.N), after the supermarket chain narrowed its annual sales forecast and missed quarterly sales estimates.
In contrast, Dollar General (DG.N), surged 14% after the discount retailer raised its annual profit forecast.
Snowflake (SNOW.N), tumbled 11.4% after the cloud data analytics company's fourth-quarter product revenue forecast was below lofty investor expectations for stronger growth.
Hormel Foods (HRL.N), advanced 3.8% after the Skippy peanut butter maker forecast annual profit above estimates.
Advancing issues outnumbered decliners by a 1.06-to-1 ratio on the NYSE and by a 1.39-to-1 ratio on the Nasdaq.
The S&P 500 posted 31 new 52-week highs and five new lows while the Nasdaq Composite recorded 114 new highs and 52 new lows.
Volume on U.S. exchanges was 15.13 billion shares, compared with the 17.98 billion average for the full session over the last 20 trading days.
Reporting by Chuck Mikolajczak; additional reporting by Johann M Cherian and Pranav Kashyap in Bengaluru; Editing by Tasim Zahid, Krishna Chandra Eluri and David Gregorio
