Battered Sectors Slammed Again as Market Dives; Nasdaq Sinks Too
The weak just keep getting weaker.
Sellers hammered away on Friday at many of the same stock market sectors that have suffered the most in recent months.
As worries over the Federal Reserve’s plans for interest rates once again gripped Wall Street, the Dow industrials’ 295.05-point, 2.8% decline on Friday was led by financial, energy and heavy-industry issues such as paper and auto stocks.
But tech and telecom shares also took a spill, pulling the Nasdaq composite index down 3% from Thursday’s record. Telecom giant Global Crossing’s poor fourth-quarter financial report cast a pall on that sector.
Trading on Nasdaq was marred by a 2 1/2-hour glitch in its mainframe computer in which the value of most indexes could not be calculated. The problem occurred between 8:30-11 a.m. PST.
Trading of individual stocks wasn’t interrupted, however.
In the bond market, Treasury yields declined even in the wake of Fed Chairman Alan Greenspan’s warning Thursday that the central bank is poised to push its key short-term interest rate, now 5.75%, higher in coming months.
Treasury issues may have attracted money coming out of stocks. The 30-year T-bond yield fell to 6.15% from 6.22% Thursday.
On the New York Stock Exchange losers topped winners by 23 to 7, while losers had a 25-to-15 edge on Nasdaq.
Among Friday’s highlights:
* Battered financial stocks included American Express, down $9.69 to $138.25, and J.P Morgan, down $3.50 to $109.38.
* Energy stocks sliding included Exxon Mobil, down $2.88 to $75, and Chevron, down $1.56 to $76.19.
* Among telecom issues, BellSouth fell $2.38 to $40 and MCI Worldcom lost $3.13 to $46.13.
* Some sizzling biotechs got clipped by profit-taking. Millennium Pharmaceuticals plunged $41.44 to $273.13; Human Genome Sciences tumbled $17.31 to $200.25.
* Some new tech stock offerings bucked the decline. Taiwanese Internet access provider GigaMedia (ticker symbol: GIGM) rocketed $61 to $88.
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Dow 10,000 . . . Again?
The Dow Jones industrials plunged 295.05 points, or 2.8%, to 10,219.52 on Friday--the latest selloff in what has been an exceptionally volatile six weeks. The Dow now is down 12.8% from its record high amid growing fears over how many more interest rate hikes the Federal Reserve has planned to slow the economy. Monthly closes and latest for the Dow:
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The Market’s Weak Links
Selling on Friday was concentrated in some of the same market sectors that have been weakest in recent months, including bank, oil, heavy-industry and transportation issues. Year-to-date declines in key indexes:
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Source: Bloomberg News
* GREENSPAN THREAT
Fed chief clearly wants market to slow down, analysts say. A1
