U.S. stocks inch higher despite a big drop in Chinese markets

U.S. stocks finished mostly higher Friday as they wrapped up a quiet week of trading, but China’s main index fell 5.5 percent.

The Standard & Poor’s 500 index fluctuated early but managed a small gain as telecommunications and financial stocks rose.

Disney fell 3 percent, dragging down the Dow Jones industrial average after the company said ESPN lost 3 million subscribers in the last year. Disney fell $3.54, or 3 percent, to $115.13, its biggest one-day loss since August. ESPN’s subscribers dropped a second year in a row, to 92 million. A drop was expected, but its size apparently surprised investors.

Oil prices also slumped, dragging down energy stocks. Benchmark U.S. crude fell $1.33, or 3.1 percent, to $41.71 a barrel in New York.

The Dow fell 14.90, or 0.08 percent, to 17,798.49. The S&P 500 rose 1.24, or 0.06 percent, to 2,090.11. The Nasdaq composite index rose 11.38, or 0.22 percent, to 5,127.52.

U.S. stocks seemed unfazed by a big drop in Chinese markets, which had been on the rebound after a turbulent summer. But on Friday the main Shanghai share index lost 5.5 percent, its biggest percentage drop in three months. Word that a government investigation of the markets included two top brokerages contributed to the fall, and analysts also thought investors were selling to have cash ready for some coming initial public offerings.

In the U.S., stocks didn’t have much momentum in a week of light trading. The market made its biggest weekly gain of 2015 last week, but this week the Dow fell 0.1 percent and the S&P 500 rose less than 0.1 percent.

The largest losers on the S&P 500 were energy stocks. Consol Energy lost 52 cents, or 6.5 percent, to $7.48. Southwestern Energy gave up 68 cents, or 7.2 percent, to $8.74.

Prudential Financial market strategist Quincy Krosby said oil prices gained a premium this week because of geopolitical concerns such as increased military action against the Islamic State and growing tensions between Russia and Turkey after Turkey shot down a Russian fighter plane Tuesday.

Krosby said those gains may not last long. Next week OPEC will hold a meeting in Vienna, and the group could send oil prices higher by deciding to cut back on production. Or it could decide to keep producing oil at its present rate, which might make prices fall further.

This story was originally published November 27, 2015 at 4:33 PM with the headline "U.S. stocks inch higher despite a big drop in Chinese markets."