NEW YORK (AP) - Stocks closed mostly lower on Thursday, with chemicals and agricultural companies taking the largest losses. The price of gold continued its long surge. Trading was quiet on the final day of a stormy first quarter that produced surprising gains.
Indexes were little changed for most of the day, then gradually slid from small gains to small losses in the afternoon. A shaky industry outlook hurt agriculture, fertilizer and farm equipment companies.
Gold prices inched higher to complete their biggest quarterly gain in almost 30 years. The Dow Jones industrial average and Standard & Poor's 500 index, both of which were down more than 10 percent last month, finished the quarter higher.
At the start of this year, investors seemed eager to turn the page on 2015. But the market plunged as investors feared for the health of the global economy. Tobias Levkovich, chief U.S. Equity Strategist for Citi Investment Research, said investors bought traditionally defensive stocks as the market fell, including health care companies and companies that make consumer goods. Then stocks rallied, and many of those companies suffered while energy companies and others recovered.
The Dow fell 31.57 points, or 0.2 percent, to 17,685.09. The S&P 500 shed 4.21 points, or 0.2 percent, to 2,059.74 The Nasdaq composite index rose 0.55 points to 4,869.85.
The price of gold rose $7.30, or 0.6 percent, to $1,234.20 an ounce. In the first quarter gold rose 16 percent, its largest gain in any quarter since 1986, going higher because of concerns about the health of the global economy, central bank policies, and, more recently, because the U.S. dollar has started to weaken after years of gains. Gold had fallen for six quarters in a row.
The price of silver rose 25 cents, or 1.7 percent, to $15.46 an ounce. Copper lost 1 cent to $2.18 a pound.