Stocks Slip After Hitting 2012 Highs, Hurt by Tech Stocks

NEW YORK (TheStreet) -- Major U.S. equity indices fell, reversing gains, after reaching their highest levels of the year earlier in the day. Technology stocks led the declines.

A comment from Dennis Lockhart, the president of the Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta, that more monetary easing may not cure many of the current economic problems also contributed to the lost momentum.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 68 points, or 0.5%, to 13,204.

The blue-chip index, which began the day up 8.6% so far in 2012, ran as high as 13,330.76 earlier in the day, coming within 10 points of its intraday high for the year and eclipsing its May 1 closing peak for 2012 of 13,279.32.

Losers were outpaced gainers on the Dow 22 to 8. The biggest percentage winners were JPMorgan Chase(JPM) , Cisco(CSCO) , Kraft(KFT) and McDonald's(MCD) .

Blue-chip losers included Verizon(VZ) , Merck(MRK) , Walt Disney(DIS) and Hewlett-Packard(HPQ) .

The S&P 500 lost 5 points, or 0.4%, to 1,413.17. The index's session-peak of 1426.68 was a new high for 2012 and its best overall level since May 2008.

The strongest sectors in the broad market were basic materials, financials, capital goods and consumer cyclicals. The weakest were technology and utilities.

A big weight in the technology sector was Apple(AAPL) , which reached a new intraday high of $674.88 at the start of the session, but slid 1.4% by the close. The stock was hit with a rare analyst downgrade by a little-known firm.

The Nasdaq shed 9 points, or 0.3%, to 3,067.

As has been the case throughout August, volume was comparatively light with just 3.23 billion shares changing hands on the New York Stock Exchange and 1.56 billion shares in play on the Nasdaq.

The market's initial rally was fueled by optimism that upcoming meetings between top eurozone officials later this week may result in progress on easing the continent's debt crisis.