Stocks wobbled Thursday as investors changed course and tempered their expectations for faster economic growth. Industrial companies, which have surged over the last few months, finished lower as Wall Street focused on gold, bonds and companies that pay big dividends.

Construction equipment, transportation and metals companies skidded and small-company stocks, which are more sensitive to changes in economic growth, also slumped. Technology companies fell for the first time in February. The biggest gains went to utilities, real estate investment trusts, and other companies that pay hefty dividends. Despite all that, the Dow Jones industrial average, which tracks 30 large U.S. stocks, rose for the 10th day in a row.

The Dow added 34.72 points, or 0.2 percent, to 20,810.32. The Standard & Poor’s 500 index rose 0.99 points to 2,363.81. The Nasdaq composite lost 25.12 points, or 0.4 percent, to 5,835.51. The Russell 2000 index of smaller-company stocks slid 9.23 points, or 0.7 percent, to 1,394.62.

The price of copper fell 3.3 percent to $2.64 a pound, its biggest one-day decline in more than a year. Bond prices rose. The yield on the 10-year Treasury note fell to 2.37 percent from 2.42 percent.

Mortgage rates increase slightly

Long-term U.S. mortgage rates rose slightly this week, continuing a holding pattern that has prevailed this month.

Mortgage buyer Freddie Mac said Thursday that the rate on 30-year, fixed-rate loans edged up to 4.16 percent from 4.15 percent last week. The benchmark rate stood at 3.62 percent a year ago and averaged 3.65 percent through 2016.

The rate on 15-year mortgages rose to 3.37 percent from 3.35 percent last week.

Mortgage rates surged in the weeks following President Donald Trump’s election in November. Investors bid rates higher because they expect Trump’s plans to cut taxes and increase spending will drive up economic growth and inflation.

Applications for jobless benefits up

The Labor Department said Thursday that 244,000 Americans applied for jobless aid last week, up by 6,000 from the previous week. The four-week average, a less volatile measure, fell by 4,000 to 241,000, lowest since July 1973.

Overall, 2.06 million people are collecting unemployment, down 7.7 percent from a year ago.

Unemployment claims are a proxy for layoffs. They have come in below 300,000 a week for 103 straight weeks, the longest such streak since 1970.

Employers added a healthy 227,000 jobs in January after averaging 187,000 a month last year. The unemployment rate is 4.8 percent, which the Fed considers full employment.