New York — Blue chip stocks capped their worst-ever weekly point drop and biggest percentage loss in more than 11 years Friday, pummeled by pessimism that the economy and corporate profits will be able to turn around at all this year.
Not even hopes for a big interest rate cut next week by the Federal Reserve could ease the pain.
Mike Eugenides holds his head as he watches prices tumble in the S&P 500 Futures pit near the end of trading at the Chicago Mercantile Exchange. Friday was a triple witching day, when option contracts and futures contracts expire; on such days, the market typically sees heavy volume and price volatility.
The Dow Jones industrial average tumbled 207.87, or 2.1 percent, to 9,823.41.
The Nasdaq composite index fell 49.80, or 2.57 percent, to 1,890.91, and the Standard & Poor's 500 fell 23.03, or 2 percent, to 1,150.53.
The stock market's statistics for the week, which included a 436-point slide in the Dow on Monday and another 317-point drop Wednesday, attest to the gloom that pervades Wall Street:
l The Dow lost 821.21, eclipsing the 805.71 the blue chips lost during the week ended April 14, 2000. The Dow's 7.71 percent slide for the week was its biggest since losing 7.76 percent the week ended Oct. 13, 1989, but it was only 44th on the index's list of worst weekly percentage declines.
The blue chips now have fallen 16.2 percent since peaking at 11,722.98 on Jan. 14, 2000.
l The Nasdaq fell 161.87 or nearly 7.9 percent for the week, leaving the index 62.5 percent below its peak of 5,048.62 on March 10, 2000. The Nasdaq also is at its lowest close since Nov. 17, 1998.
l The S&P 500 fell 82.89 or 6.72 percent for the week. It has lost a quarter of its value from its high of 1,527.46 a year ago.
The declines brought the Dow below 10,000 for the first time in 27 months and pulled the Nasdaq under 2,000 for the first time since October. The selling sliced $772.36 billion from the total value of U.S. stocks, according to Wilshire Associates of Santa Monica, Calif.
"We're having a confidence crisis, not an economic one," said Alfred Goldman, director of market analysis at A.G. Edwards & Sons Inc. in St. Louis. "There's a lot of extreme pessimism in the market now."
But others were more reluctant to say whether the bout of selling is nearing an end. Alan Ackerman, senior vice president at Fahnestock & Co., said it was anyone's guess whether the market had hit bottom.
"If one cannot assess where the bottom is, it's best to sit on the sidelines," he said. "Cash is king."
Friday's selloff was triggered by the latest warnings from a bellwether tech companies.
Compaq's stock was off 50 cents at $18, and other major tech shares also fell. Applied Materials was off $1.88 at $44.25 and Cisco Systems was off 38 cents at $19.94.
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