From Deseret News archives:
Terror fears depress Dow
Stock average falls back to just above 10,000 level
The blue chips came close to breaching 10,000 for the first time since Dec. 12 after Israeli troops killed the leader of the Palestinian group Hamas early Monday. Hamas has promised retaliation against both Israel and the United States.
The turbulence in the Middle East discouraged equity investors already uneasy about a slow economic recovery and tepid job growth. Wall Street was also worried about decreased consumer spending due to rising oil prices.
"The geopolitical situation is dominating the markets, but it's a very strange thing because there's no way to quantify it," said Peter Dunay, chief market strategist at Wall Street Access. "It definitely puts investors on edge. They've already factored in a lot of future positives, and when that's threatened, they react."
The Dow Jones industrial average finished the session down 121.85, or 1.2 percent, at 10,064.75. The index fell as low as 10,012.23 in afternoon trading. The Dow came off a 53.48 loss last week and has lost 672.95, or 6.3 percent, since its recent high of 10,737.70 on Feb. 17.
The declines cut across every sector, with technology shares particularly hard hit due to the turmoil over the presidential election in Taiwan, where some of the strongest technology manufacturers are based. Airlines stocks also fell sharply due to downgrades from brokerage houses, worries about a drop in travel due to terrorism and rising fuel prices.
With no major economic news due until week's end and first-quarter earnings still a month away, the markets were particularly susceptible to bad news abroad. Corporate fundamentals and the underlying economy remain solid, but investors will likely need a string of better-than-expected economic data and earnings to pull out of the correction that kept the major indexes down for the past few weeks.
"Today it's terrorism, yesterday it might have been oil prices," said Hugh Johnson, chief investment officer at First Albany Corp. "Every day now, there's a reason to worry that forecasts for the economy and earnings are just too optimistic, and tomorrow it's going to be something else."
Comments
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- Settlers reject Netanyahu plea 8:25 a.m.
- Poll: Isolationism soars 8:21 a.m.
- Why is Y. ignoring spew of hatred?
- Unbeaten BYU takes trip to Logan
- Mitchell said to share LeBaron traits
- Teen girl killed in Kaysville crash
- BCS just keeps dirty laundry on spin
- Woods says he let family down
- Miles is back, but others still out
- Utahns growing tired of Bennett
- MWC awaits bowl destinations
- 2 citations issued at Y.-U. game
- Hall mouths off about hate of Utah
914 - Cougars beat Utes in overtime
483 - Hall reprimanded by MWC
406 - Max Hall issues apology
392 - Hall's pain reflects self-betrayal
359 - Utes won't respond to Hall
278 - Why is Y. ignoring spew of hatred?
248 - BYU says Hall incident resolved
244 - 2 citations issued at Y.-U. game
184 - Religion in politics is tiresome
154
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