U.S. stocks ended slightly lower, heading into the holiday on a down note in a week that saw records for the Dow industrials and the S&P 500 but quiet trading.  Little major news emerged during the week to drive the market sharply higher or lower, and traders said investors saw little reason to make big portfolio shifts. Trading volumes were low, with 4.89 billion shares changing hands on Friday, well below the average daily volume this year of 6.58 billion and the fewest shares since Dec. 30.  The stock market will be closed Monday for Memorial Day.  “Volumes have been anemic,” said Neil Massa, senior equity trader at John Hancock Asset Management. “But the trend [in stock prices] seems to be higher. Even on days with pullbacks, it seems to be healthy consolidation.”  The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 53.72 points, or 0.3%, to 18232.02. The S&P 500 declined 4.76 points, or 0.2%, to 2126.06, and the Nasdaq Composite Index shed 1.43 points, or 0.03%, to 5089.36.  For the week, the Dow slipped 0.2%, while the S&P 500 added 0.2% and the Nasdaq Composite gained 0.8%.  As first-quarter earnings season draws to a close, investor focus is largely back on the timing of any interest-rate increase by the Federal Reserve, traders said. Fed Chairwoman Janet Yellen on Friday reiterated the central bank’s intention to raise short-term interest rates this year.  Many investors expect the Fed to increase rates in December, but there is little consensus as to whether slightly higher borrowing costs will derail a bull market for stocks that is in its seventh year. In her remarks Friday, Ms. Yellen also emphasized the economic headwinds such as slow wage growth, low inflation and disappointing growth, which investors viewed as continuing to discourage the Fed from embarking on an aggressive series of rate increases.  Ms. Yellen’s speech “leaves the markets still churning, looking for an event or a time or magnitude for the Fed to move,” said Paul Christopher, head of International Strategy, Wells Fargo Investment Institute.  Meanwhile, on Friday the Labor Department released a stronger-than-expected reading on inflation in April. The consumer-price index rose 0.1% from a month earlier. Excluding the food and energy categories, core prices gained 0.3%, the largest increase since January 2013. Economists surveyed by The Wall Street Journal had expected overall prices to increase 0.1% and core prices to rise 0.2%.  In Europe, Germany’s DAX index slipped 0.4%, while France’s CAC-40 edged down 0.1%.  In commodity markets, gold shed 0.01%, to $1,204.30 a troy ounce. Crude-oil prices lost 1.6%, to $59.72 a barrel. Bond prices fell, pushing the yield on the 10-year Treasury note to 2.211%, compared with 2.186% on Thursday, as bond yields move inversely to prices.  In corporate news, Deere rose $3.89, or 4.4%, to $93.35, after the farm-equipment producer reported its profit dropped in the latest quarter, though results were still better than feared.  Campbell Soup said its profit easily topped expectations in the latest quarter, as the company began implementing cost-cutting plans. Shares rose 98 cents, or 2.1%, to 47.91.  Aéropostale tumbled 40 cents, or 15%, to 2.19, after the teen retailer projected a wider-than-expected loss for the July quarter.  Write to Corrie Driebusch at corrie.driebusch@wsj.com
U.S. stocks ended slightly lower Friday, capping off a week of low trading volumes and no market-moving catalysts.