Vonage down in NYSE debut

At mid-afternoon in New York, equities markets were down as new data showed durable goods orders lower than had been expected but new home sales up more than had been predicted. The Dow Jones Industrial Average was nearly flat, down by 10.08 points to 11,088.27, while the Nasdaq Composite and the S&P 500 each had dropped 0.3 percent, to 2,153.62 and 1,252.97 respectively.

A decline in the price of crude oil after last week’s inventories report took ConocoPhillips down 2.8 percent to $60.92, while Chevron lost 1.5 percent to $57.22.

Miners were down as well with a decline in metals prices. Barrick Gold dropped 4.1 percent to $29.84, while Newmont Mining was down 4.2 percent to $49.02.

Internet telephone provider Vonage began trading on the New York Stock Exchange during the day. Shares lost 13 percent from their initial price in the first half-hour of trade and by the middle of the afternoon it was trading 13.2 percent lower at $14.76, on a volume nearly double that of any other NYSE stock on the day. In another initial public offering, scheduled for Thursday, Mastercard is scheduled to present the largest US IPO in two years.

Stock exchanges weren’t faring very well during the day. The InterContinental Exchange lost 8.6 percent to $53.87, while NYSE Group had declined by 5.7 percent to $57.93.

Gainers on the day included General Motors, up 7.2 percent to $26.24 on an upgrade from “neutral” to “buy” from Merrill Lynch.

After recent losses, Microsoft was up 2.4 percent to $23.34.

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