ADRs End Lower; Teva, Criteo Trade Actively

International stocks trading in New York closed lower on Thursday.

The BNY Mellon index of American depositary receipts fell 0.6% to 150.34. The European index declined 0.6% to 140.02. The Asian index declined 0.5% to 177.43. The Latin American index fell 1% to 236.75. And the emerging-markets index fell 0.6% to 316.63.

Teva Pharmaceutical Industries Ltd. (TEVA, TEVA.TV) and Criteo SA (CRTO) were among those with ADRs that traded actively.

BP PLC (BP, BP.LN) suffered a setback to its post-Deepwater Horizon recovery plans on Thursday after the Australian government said it would block a $1 billion deal that would have made it the country's dominant consumer-fuel retailer. The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission said the 1.79 billion Australian dollar ($1.37 billion) deal to buy a network of gas stations from Woolworths Ltd. would significantly reduce competition in the country's retail fuel supply. BP's proposal to sell some of the sites wouldn't address these concerns, the watchdog said. ADRs closed down 0.1% at $40.63.

France-based ad tech company Criteo said a recent move by Apple Inc. to strengthen its ad-tracker prevention could lower its 2018 revenue, minus traffic acquisition costs, by 22%. Criteo is particularly affected because it specializes in an advertising method called "retargeting," which involves serving ads to people who have already visited a website to remind them to return. The method relies heavily on tracking users as they browse from site to site. ADRs plunged 23% to $24.42.

Teva, the world's largest generic drug maker, on Thursday said it intends to eliminate about 14,000 jobs, more than 25% of its workforce, suspend dividend payouts and close factories and research facilities under a plan to slash $3 billion in costs by the end of 2019. Union leaders in Israel have promised a rare general strike in protest of the job cuts. In addition, some members of parliament are calling on the government to withhold billions of dollars in tax benefits if Teva doesn't reach a fair deal with those losing their jobs in Israel. ADRs rose 10% to $17.30.

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

December 14, 2017 18:35 ET (23:35 GMT)