US STOCKS-Wall St slips as U.S.-China tensions weigh, investors watch retail

(For a live blog on the U.S. stock market, click LIVE/ or
type LIVE/ in a news window.)
* China warns of counter measures against U.S. law
* Retail shares dip as Black Friday kicks off
* U.S. stock markets shut early after Thanksgiving holiday
* Indexes off: Dow 0.4%, S&P 0.4%, Nasdaq 0.46%

(Updates to close, adds commentary, changes byline)
By Sinéad Carew
Nov 29 (Reuters) - Wall Street's major indexes ended
Friday's shorter session lower as U.S.-China discord over Hong
Kong fueled investor anxiety about trade talks and retail stocks
dipped as in-store Black Friday sales appeared to draw smaller
crowds.
China on Thursday threatened to retaliate against a U.S. law
backing pro-democracy protesters in Hong Kong with potential
measures including barring drafters of the legislation from
mainland China, Hong Kong and Macau, the editor of China's
state-backed Global Times tabloid said in a tweet. And on Friday a Reuters report cited two sources saying the
U.S. government may expand its power to stop more foreign
shipments of products with U.S. technology to China's Huawei,
due to frustration that a blacklisting failed to end supplies to
the world's largest telecoms equipment maker. While the S&P closed above its session low, selling
intensified in the last hour of trading after the report on
Huawei.
All three of Wall Street's major indexes had registered
record highs earlier in the week when hopes were higher for an
imminent "phase one" U.S.-China trade deal. The trade-sensitive
Philadelphia Semiconductor index .SOX fell 1.1%.
For the month preliminary Refinitiv data showed that the S&P
rose 3.4% while the Dow gained 3.7% and Nasdaq climbed 4.5%. It
was the the biggest monthly gain for all three major indexes
since June.
The U.S.-China news gave "a little bit of a weaker tone" to
Friday's market, Jack Janasiewicz, a portfolio manager and
strategist at Natixis Investment Managers Solutions in Boston.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average .DJI fell 112.59 points,
or 0.4%, to 28,051.41, the S&P 500 .SPX lost 12.65 points, or
0.40%, to 3,140.98 and the Nasdaq Composite .IXIC dropped
39.70 points, or 0.46%, to 8,665.47.
While many traders took the day off after Thursday's U.S.
Thanksgiving holiday, Janasiewicz said others were likely on the
sidelines as they waited for economic data including the jobs
report due out next week and any retailer comments about initial
numbers for the year-end holiday shopping season.
"We've got a good slate of data coming next week that'll give
us a better indication where we are in the cycle and people are
going to want to know how did today's retail sales go," he said.
Spot check reports on retailers around the country showed
fewer people than in past years lining up outside stores at the
start of Black Friday, suggesting that online buying may have
taken the shine off America's biggest shopping day. "Looking at foot traffic volume is not quite as telling any
more. It's going to be online shopping as well. That's going to
be the bigger one," said Janasiewicz.
"Are people getting up, getting dressed and going out and
shopping physically or are they just getting dressed, moving to
the couch and turning on their computer and ordering online."
The S&P 500 retail sector .SPXRT fell 0.8%, with Kohl's
Corp KSS.N dropping 2.7% and Gap GPS.N falling 1.8%. Top
retailer Walmart Inc WMT.N rose 0.3% while Costco COST.O
fell 0.3% and electronics retailer Best Buy Co Inc BBY.N also
dipped.
Shares of Tech Data Corp TECD.O jumped 12.3% as private
equity firm Apollo Global Management APO.N raised its bid for
the U.S. information technology equipment distributor to about
$5.14 billion. Declining issues outnumbered advancing ones on the NYSE by a
1.86-to-1 ratio; on Nasdaq, a 1.35-to-1 ratio favored decliners.
The S&P 500 posted 18 new 52-week highs and one new low; the
Nasdaq Composite recorded 75 new highs and 28 new lows.
Trading volume was light in the truncated session with 3.55
billion shares changing hands on U.S. exchanges compared with
the 6.86 billion average for the last 20 sessions.