By Caroline Valetkevitch
NEW YORK (Reuters) - U.S. stocks were lower at midday on Tuesday, with McDonald's down after it reported lower August same-store sales in all regions.
McDonald's stock was down 0.9 percent. The August same-store sales decline was its fifth monthly drop since Chief Executive Officer Don Thompson took the helm in July 2012, and warned a China supplier scandal would cut into profits.
Helping to limit the day's slide were shares of Apple. The stock was up 1.6 percent in heavy trading ahead of the iPhone maker's "special event" in California, where it is expected to debut a smartwatch.
"The bias for the market is certainly to the upside, and it will be interesting to see how Apple trades this afternoon," said Tim Ghriskey, chief investment officer of Solaris Group in Bedford Hills, New York. "There could easily be selling on the news. (The stock) has had a big run up in anticipation of the event. If there is selling, that could weigh on the overall market."
The Dow Jones industrial average fell 64.25 points, or 0.38 percent, to 17,047.17, the S&P 500 lost 6.03 points, or 0.3 percent, to 1,995.51 and the Nasdaq Composite dropped 12.11 points, or 0.26 percent, to 4,580.18.
The largest percentage gainer on the New York Stock Exchange was Annie's, which rose 37.85 percent, while the largest percentage decliner was Leidos Holdings, down 15.29 percent.
Among the most active stocks on the NYSE was Brazil's Petrobras.
Besides Apple, Yahoo, down 1.7 percent at $41.12 and SinoCoking Coal, up 194.2 percent to $8.59, were among the most actively traded on the Nasdaq.
Declining issues were outnumbering advancing ones on the NYSE by 2,105 to 840, for a 2.51-to-1 ratio on the downside; on the Nasdaq, 1,819 issues were falling and 796 advancing for a 2.29-to-1 ratio favoring decliners.
The broad S&P 500 index was posting 15 new 52-week highs and one new lows; the Nasdaq Composite was recording 44 new highs and 38 new lows.
(Editing by Nick Zieminski and Chris Reese)
