Wall Street slips

Wall Street finished mostly lower today as investors cashed in some gains from last week’s rally and readied for quarterly corporate earnings reports.

The Treasury bond market was closed for the Columbus Day holiday and there was no major economic news to guide investors, so Wall Street remained cautious ahead of the flood of third-quarter results. Aluminum producer Alcoa Inc., one of the 30 Dow Jones industrial average components, kicks off the earnings season tomorrow.