AlHijjah 27, 1434, Nov 1, 2013, SPA -- U.S. stocks closed modestly lower Thursday, one day after the Federal Reserve (Fed) said that it will do exactly what the market wanted. In U.S. economic news, the Fed's bond buying program has been a catalyst for an epic stock market run this year, but investors now seem to need more compelling reasons to keep pushing stocks higher. Some investors had hoped that the central bank would mention what impact the recent government shutdown had on economic growth. If the Fed sounded more negative about the economy, it might have been interpreted as a sign that the central bank may keep buying bonds well into 2014. In international economic news, investors around the globe also appear to be suffering from rally fatigue. European markets closed mixed and nearly all Asian markets ended in the red. In corporate news, Facebook faked out investors late Wednesday. The social media site's stock spiked 15 percent after hours when it announced that earnings and revenues easily beat forecasts thanks to strong mobile growth. But investors became spooked when the company said during its conference call that the number of teen users who were visiting the social networking site on a daily basis had fallen. China's equivalent of Craigslist, 58.com, debuted Thursday, and shares closed up more than 40 percent. Expedia's stock jumped more than 18 percent on better-than-expected earnings. Meanwhile, Priceline's stock dipped. Shares of Priceline have been extremely hot this year, recently surging above the $1,000 mark. Exxon Mobil reported a sharp drop in profits but the oil company's shares still rallied Thursday. The dollar lost ground against the euro, the pound, and the yen. Light sweet crude oil for December delivery dropped 39 cents to $96.38 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange. Gold futures lost $25.60 to $1,323.70 an ounce. The Dow Jones industrial average fell 73.01, or 0.47 percent, to 15,545.75. The broader Standard & Poor's 500 index lost 6.77, or 0.38 percent, to 1,756.54. The technology-heavy Nasdaq composite index dropped 10.91, or 0.28 percent, to 3,919.71.
