US stocks slip amid interest rate jitters

Wall Street gave up a big advance and turned lower today as investors suffered a renewed case of the jitters ahead of the Federal Reserve’s meeting on interest rates later this week.

The stock market, which has seen huge swings in recent weeks, was initially relieved to hear from the National Association of Realtors that existing home sales declined in May by only 0.3% to 5.99 million units. The tepid reading was expected, and indicated that the housing sector is still weak – the pace of existing home sales was the slowest in four years, housing inventories rose by 5% to the highest level since 1992, and the median home price fell for a record 10th consecutive month.