Wall Street finishes with moderate losses

Calcutta News.Net
Thursday 3rd December, 2009

U.S. stocks were mixed early Thursday, but tumbled in the final half hour of trading.

The tech sector fared best of all, buts its losses were still above half-a-percent. Financials were encouraged by an announcement from Bank of America which said it would repay $45 billion of TARP money.

Investors were encouraged by remarks from Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke, who told a U.S. senate hearing reviewing his renomination, that he did not see any "extreme misvaluations," regarding asset prices in the current near-zero interest rate environment.

Oil prices were lower as the U.S. dollar continued its retreat against the euro.

At the close of trading the Dow Jones Industrials were down 86.53 points or 0.83% at 10,366.15. The Nasdaq Composite was down 11.89 points or 0.54% at 2,173.14. The Standard and Poor's 500 was down 9.32 points or 0.84% at 1,099.92.

While the euro gained on Thursday, the Japanese yen and British pound retreated. Around the New York close Thursday the euro was quoted at 1.5068 while the Australian dollar firmed to .9248.

The yen retreated to 88.21, and sterling to 1.6560. The Canadian dollar edged down to 1.0549.
The Swiss franc was at .9998.

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