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Stocks Diving to Bear Market Levels

S&P slips below threshold at this morning's open

By Kevin Spak,  Newser Staff

Posted Oct 4, 2011 8:42 AM CDT

(Newser) – Wall Street is getting nervous, and not because of protesters. Stocks have been plummeting hard, and are now just inches above the threshold for what traders consider a bear market. The Dow dove 240 points on Friday and another 258 yesterday, leaving it perilously close to the bear market threshold of 10,248, the Wall Street Journal reports. The S&P slid below the threshold at this morning's open.

The S&P wasn't the only thing going from bad to worse at the bell: The Dow fell about 120 points, while the S&P and Nasdaq dropped 12 and 20 points respectively. The main reason for the panic? Greece. “All the market cares about right now is Europe,” one strategist tells Bloomberg. “Every investment decision is being made through the prism of Europe and the expectation that Greece is going to default and drag the rest of the world into a recession."

Traders work on the floor at the New York Stock Exchange in New York, Monday, Oct. 3, 2011.
Traders work on the floor at the New York Stock Exchange in New York, Monday, Oct. 3, 2011.   (AP Photo/Seth Wenig)
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COMMENTS
Showing 3 of 4 comments
Barack_Must_Go
Oct 4, 2011 2:49 PM CDT
It's Obama stupid !
boxcar
Oct 4, 2011 1:46 PM CDT
The "UP TICK RULE" has yet to be reinstated (This rule req'd a stock to go up BEFORE it could be shorted) so much for fixing faults in financial markets, root causes of financial mess that collapsed the economy.Wall Street fat cats are about to begin the rest of the storm we will call The Great Recession as the Eye of the storm passes over us- ahead is the rest of it, only to worsen with time as we approach the full force coming ashore in late 2013- Prepare for a repeat of 2008 but in reverse timing- 2nd half of the buzz saw is ramping up Eye of the storm was 2009.5 to 2011.3. Rest of storm is coming ashore as I type- Front end of storm was 2007.5 (when UP TICK rule was eliminated) until 2009.5 when Fed saw storm had ended (EYE of a storm has no winds) but ahead is rest of it- Google "Mortgage Resets" to view what's written.
timeandagain
Oct 4, 2011 10:36 AM CDT
Blame it on Europe!

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