US STOCKS-Dow, S&P 500 end lower; Eli Lilly shares fall after drug data

By Caroline Valetkevitch

NEW YORK, Aug 7 (Reuters) - The Dow and S&P 500 eased on Thursday, as shares of Eli Lilly dropped after data from its oral weight loss drug disappointed, while Nasdaq ended slightly higher.

Shares of cybersecurity firm Fortinet FTNT.O also dropped after it gave a revenue forecast below Wall Street estimates.

Eli Lilly LLY.N, which also raised its full-year profit and sales forecast, fell after the orforglipron drug data.

Investors also digested a Bloomberg report that Fed Governor Christopher Waller was U.S. President Donald Trump's top candidate for the U.S. central bank's chair post.

Trump has been critical of current Chair Jerome Powell for holding off on cutting borrowing costs. Many investors expect the Fed to cut interest rates in September.

"The market rally is beginning to look a little bit tired here. We ran up on earnings, and of course the market was basically ignoring a lot of the tariff news," said Peter Cardillo, chief market economist at Spartan Capital Securities in New York.

The S&P 500 and Nasdaq had hit a string of record highs recently.

According to preliminary data, the S&P 500 .SPX lost 4.19 points, or 0.07%, to end at 6,340.87 points, while the Nasdaq Composite .IXIC gained 74.50 points, or 0.35%, to 21,243.92. The Dow Jones Industrial Average .DJI fell 218.80 points, or 0.50%, to 43,974.32.

Among other decliners, chipmaker Intel INTC.O was down after Trump called for the immediate resignation of new Intel CEO Lip-Bu Tan, calling him "highly conflicted" due to his ties to Chinese firms.

Helping the Nasdaq, Apple AAPL.O shares rose after the latest tariff salvo from Trump largely exempted industry heavyweights from his threat to impose 100% levy on chips and semiconductors.

The U.S. president announced a tariff of about 100% on imports of semiconductors, but said it would not apply to companies that are manufacturing in the U.S. or have committed to do so.

Trump's higher tariffs on imports from dozens of countries kicked in on Thursday, raising the average U.S. import duty to its highest in a century.

Trump is also expected to announce his interim replacement for Fed Governor Adriana Kugler in the coming days amid expectations that the nominee would be a policy dove who will likely favor bringing interest rates lower.

Rate cut expectations remained largely the same after the day's data on the labor market.

Weekly initial jobless claims rose 7,000 to a seasonally adjusted 226,000, the highest level since the week ended July 5 and slightly above the 221,000 estimate of economists polled by Reuters, according to the data.

Market expectations for a September rate cut of at least 25 basis points from the Fed stood at 93.2%, down slightly from the 94.6% in the prior session and well above the 37.7% from a week ago, according to CME's FedWatch Tool.