Failure to sustain a rebound from midday losses left stocks to roll into the red during the final hour. They still made it out with week 2% higher than where they started.

The major equity averages lacked direction this morning, even though premarket participants had cheered the September jobs report. Nonfarm payrolls grew by 103,000, up from an upwardly revised 57,000 in August. However, the upside surprise is mostly due to the end of a strike at Verizon. Excluding those workers, payrolls increased by 58,000, which is on par with the 60,000 new jobs that had been generally expected among economists polled by Briefing.com. Meanwhile, private payrolls increased by 137,000, which came on top of the upwardly revised 42,000 jobs that were added during the prior month. An increase of 83,000 had been broadly expected.

The number of people entering the workforce was roughly the same as the number of workers who found jobs in September, so the unemployment rate remained at 9.1%, which is exactly what had been expected. However, job gains were mostly part-time, resulting in an increase in underemployment that took the "real" unemployment rate up to 16.5% from 16.2% in the prior month.

Even though the payrolls report proved better-than-expected, stocks lacked leadership at the open of trade. That made it difficult for the major equity averages to extend their streak of gains to a fourth straight session. The listlessness of early trade left stocks to slide into negative territory. Selling intensified in response to news that analysts at Fitch cut their ratings on Italy and Spain. At its low, the stock market was down more than 1%.

Stocks managed to stage a steady afternoon rebound that took the market back to a modest gain, but the move ultimately broke down in the final few minutes of trade. Although the late dive took all three major equity averages into negative territory, losses were steepest for the Nasdaq, which was hurt by weakness among biotech plays. Strength among a few blue chips helped limit the extent of the Dow's decline.

Financials were a drag all session. The sector descended to a 3.7% loss as bank stocks buckled. Banks were likely imbued by news that analysts at Moody's downgraded a dozen banks in the United Kingdom and a handful of others in Portugal.

Financials actually fueled broad market gains in the prior session, but only after the sector rallied back from an early loss. Their leadership yesterday helped the S&P 500 push through resistance at the 1160 line. Of course, the late slide on Friday caused the S&P 500 to finish the week below that mark.

Shares or retailers were also in play yesterday. The attention came after a relatively mixed batch of same-store sales results for September.

Initial weekly jobless claims on Thursday didn't have much of an influence on the mood of market participants, mostly because the 401,000 initial claims essentially matched what had been widely expected. That tally was indicative of an improving labor sector since it stayed at a level that is within the Briefing.com "Recovery Zone."

Europe was in close focus yesterday, too. Participants were generally surprised at the lack of accommodative action taken by the European Central Bank, which opted to keep its benchmark lending rate at 1.50%. The Bank of England opted to keep its target rate at 0.50%, but it increased its asset purchase plan to 275 billion pounds from 200 billion pounds. That news initially put pressure on the pound, but it eventually rallied back and even finished the week on a positive note.

Tuesday and Wednesday saw stocks climb sharply for the broad market's best back-to-back performance in more than a month. On Wednesday, participants were given insight into the official September payrolls number by an ADP Employment Change report that showed that private payrolls increased by 91,000. The Briefing.com consensus had called for an increase of 45,000. Although the report doesn't always accurately forecast the exact payrolls number, it is often directionally accurate relative to expectations. The ISM Services Index for September was shrugged off; it slipped to 53.0 from 53.3 in the prior month, but still narrowly exceeded the 52.8 that had been widely expected.

Trade on Tuesday may have kicked off a three-day rally, which took stocks 6% higher, but what's more impressive is that stocks had to crawl out of a hole that had the S&P 500 at a 52-week low and more than 20% below its May high. The rally from those depths came once participants opted, for the time being, to look past the threat that Greece could default on its debt, let alone meet its deficit reduction targets, and the systemic troubles of the broader eurozone.

Such threats had weighed heavily on trade in the first session of the week, overshadowing an improvement in the ISM Manufacturing Index to 51.6 from 50.6 when it had been expected to slip to 50.5. The increase came amid solid growth in new orders, which actually played a part in the first increase in order backlogs since early summer. Weakness on Monday marked an extension of the selling that caused stocks to slide so sharply in the fourth quarter -- the worst quarter for the market in almost three years. That weakness had many seeking the safety of the benchmark 10-year Note. The Note's yield was down to 1.75% at the start of the week, but climbed back 2.00 by week's end. The bond market will be closed on Monday in observance of Columbus Day

...Nasdaq 100 -0.7%. ..S&P Midcap 400 -1.6%. ..Russell 2000 -2.6%.