General Electric Company (GE), Caterpillar Inc. (CAT) & More: These Four Stocks Have Held the Dow Jones Industrial Average (.DJI) Back

General Electric Company (NYSE:GE), down 2.9% The big news for General Electric Company (NYSE:GE) over the past two months came in late April, when the conglomerate reported earnings. On the whole, General Electric Company (NYSE:GE) has a lot of good things happening, with its relatively new emphasis on oil and gas equipment paying off with 24% better sales, and its aviation unit seeing nearly twice that level of growth. Yet the big problem for General Electric Company (NYSE:GE) has been Europe, where major sales declines reflect the economic difficulties that have plagued plenty of companies doing business on the continent. Even if the U.S. economy keeps plowing forward and other areas of the world see accelerating growth, General Electric Company (NYSE:GE) needs to get its act together in Europe to boost growth across the entire company.

Caterpillar Inc. (NYSE:CAT), down 1.1% For Caterpillar Inc. (NYSE:CAT), the past two months have been quite volatile, with the stock having dropped about 10% only to recover nearly all of that lost ground more recently. Just before earnings, Caterpillar Inc. (NYSE:CAT) took a big hit when the bottom fell out of the gold market, as gold prices fell more than $140 in a single day. The impact of gold’s decline on its mining equipment business could be huge, as miners struggling with much narrower margins will have less money to spend on capital expenditures for Caterpillar Inc. (NYSE:CAT) equipment. Yet since then, macroeconomic moves to bolster world growth, including rate cuts from the European and Australian central banks, have given investors hope that commodities will bounce back and that mining activity will resume. Now, Caterpillar Inc. (NYSE:CAT) just needs to see that turn into a reversal of horrendous sales trends in recent months.