New York markets see second day of declines

The New York equities markets saw a second day of declines on Tuesday after Monday’s comments on inflation by Federal Reserve chairman Ben Bernanke. By midday, the Dow Jones Industrial Average had lost 1 percent to 10,941.63. It was the first time since March that the Dow fell below the 11,000 mark. The Nasdaq Composite dropped 1.1 percent to 2,146.63, and has declined by 9.4 percent in less than two months. The S&P, meanwhile, was 0.8 percent lower on the day so far, to 1,255.84.

Mining stocks were down on declines in the price of gold and copper. Alcoa dropped 3.2 percent to $30.37, while Phelps Dodge was down 3.9 percent to $28.37.

Homebuilders dropped after Wachovia cut its rating on several companies from “outperform” to “market perform”. The downgrades were for Lennar, which was down 4.1 percent to $44.61; for Pulte, which dropped 6.7 percent to $27.75; and for DR Horton, which fell 7.2 percent to $23.02.

Among stock exchange operators, NYSE Group, which entered into an agreement with Euronext last week, was down 5.5 percent to $60.03 after French president Jacques Chirac said that he would rather see the Paris-based Euronext merge with Deutsche Borse, which continues to pursue such a merger. Elsewhere in the sector, Nasdaq dropped 2.5 percent to $28.37, while Intercontinental Exchange lost 3.6 percent to $49.75.

Lenders Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac dropped 2.6 percent to $48.70 and 3.2 percent to $58.19 respectively after Credit Suisse downgraded both.

Internet search engine Google added 1.4 percent to $379.65 on the news that it will make spreadsheet software available online, possibly as a free alternative to Microsoft spreadsheet Excel.

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