Europe debt, job worries push stocks down

NEW YORK — Stocks buckled Thursday under the growing belief that the global economy is weaker than many investors expected and likely to stop companies from hiring. The Dow Jones industrials briefly traded below 10,000 for the first time in three months.

A flood of bad news, including rising debt levels in European nations and an unexpected jump in the number of Americans filing for unemployment benefits, had investors pulling money out of assets like stocks and commodities that look increasingly risky. Fears of more disappointing news Friday, when the government issues its January employment report, contributed to the slide.

Demand for safer investments sent the dollar and Treasurys higher and the euro falling. Major indexes skidded as much as 3.1 percent to their lowest levels in three months. The Dow fell 268 points and briefly traded below 10,000 for the first time since Nov. 6. The Dow's 2.6 percent drop was its biggest in seven months. And it was the ninth time in 14 days that the Dow has moved by more than 100 points.

Just 273 stocks rose on the New York Stock Exchange, while more than 2,800 fell. One of the weak performers was metals producer Freeport-McMoRan Copper & Gold Inc., which tumbled 5.3 percent. The few winners included Cisco Systems Inc. following a big increase in its earnings. Consolidated trading volume at the NYSE rose to 5.9 billion shares from 4.3 billion Wednesday.

The day's news reminded investors that the global economic recovery remains tenuous. It also raised questions about whether the market can resume its rebound from 12-year lows it hit last March.

The slide began in Europe on concerns about onerous debt levels in Greece, Portugal and Spain. Worries about those countries set off broader concerns that governments will have difficulty containing rising debts and borrowing more money to help revive their economies.

"The market is becoming aware that the wall of cash that lifted it last year is coming to an end," said Jon Merriman, chief executive of Merriman Curhan Ford in San Francisco.

The euro hit a seven-month low against the dollar; gold tumbled $49, or 4.4 percent.

The drop in stocks was the latest leg of a stumble that began in mid-January. Stocks fell then in response to China's attempts to curb its overheated growth. Those moves raised fears that the other world economies could suffer as a result. The pullback in stocks worsened as leaders in Washington said they would impose tighter regulations on U.S. banks.