Monday, November 2, 2009

A Very Scary Halloween

Friday was a rough day for the markets. After seven straight months of gains, both the S&P 500 and the Nasdaq broke those streaks by ending October with a loss. After three months of solid gains, the Dow Jones ended October up only 0.45 points - as close to a flat month as you can get.

The spookiest thing about it was how remarkably broad-based the decline was. All 30 stocks in the Dow Jones Industrial Average closed down for the day.

For the NYSE as a whole, 84 percent of the stocks declined, and only 15 percent advanced. The Nasdaq was slightly better: 79 percent of its stocks declined, and 18 percent advanced.

Within the S&P 500, only 18 stocks advanced on the day. That leaves a whopping 482 issues that declined.

That's what you call a marketwide disaster.

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