Stocks, Stocks Down | featured news

The stock market extended its longest and deepest slump of the year Tuesday, caught between a recurring nightmare of European debt and the beginning of uncertain corporate earnings reports at home. The Dow Jones industrial average fell 213.66 points, its biggest decline of the year and third triple-digit loss...

Stocks are pulling back sharply on Wall Street as investors get their first chance to react to a slowdown in hiring in the United States in March. The Dow Jones industrial average dropped 152 points to 12,908 shortly before noon Monday. The Standard & Poor's 500 index was off 18 at 1,380, and the Nasdaq composite lost 36 points to 3,044.

Since October, estimates for first-quarter earnings growth have tumbled while the S&P 500 has surged. With the earnings season starting next week, the outlook is not as sunny as in previous quarters.

Wall Street took a drubbing Wednesday as investors worried that the Federal Reserve might not be willing to pump more money into the U.S. economy.

Stocks suffered their biggest losses in three months Tuesday, the first hiccup in a strong and steady rally to start the year. Wall Street worried about the global economy and waited while Greece pressured the last investors to sign on for its bailout.

Stocks edged lower on Monday as a delay by debt-ridden Greece in accepting the terms of a bailout gave investors little reason to buy equities after a five-week rally.

Stock indexes gave back some of their gains Monday and the euro turned lower against the dollar following a report that Germany and five other major European nations could risk having their credit ratings downgraded.

The worst week for the stock market in two months ended with a whimper in thin trading Friday. The Dow Jones industrial average lost 4.8 percent this week, while the broader Standard & Poor’s 500 index fell 4.7 percent. Both had their worst weeks since Sept. 23.

The Dow Jones industrial average was down 200 points just before midday Wednesday after Italy's borrowing costs soared, a sign that Europe's debt crisis had spilled into the third-largest economy in the euro bloc.

World stocks hit a 15-month low on Tuesday and the dollar rose to a nine-month peak as fears over a major banking crisis in Europe mounted.