Wall Street optimists apparently extended their Memorial Day holiday Tuesday, leaving trading to the grumpy bunch.
In a day of below-average trading volume, stocks fell broadly. In a rare occurrence, all of the 30 stocks in the Dow Jones industrial average, led by General Motors, posted losses. The Dow lost 184.18 points, to 11,094.43.
Likewise, all 10 of the major industry groups in the Standard & Poor’s 500 index closed lower. The S&P 500 index fell 20.32, to 1259.84.
GM, a component of the Dow industrials and S&P 500 index whose recent rallies have helped inspire stock market advances, closed down $1.51, to $26.57. The stock was marked “sell” by analysts at Deutsche Bank, who said car buying has softened because of high interest rates.
Wal-Mart Stores, another component of the Dow and the S&P 500, fell $1.35, to $48.30, after the company’s May sales report came in at the low end of analysts’ estimates. Wal-Mart blamed high gasoline and utility costs for poor results at its checkout counters.
Exxon Mobil, which dropped $1.38, to $60.20, led the S&P 500 losers, even as crude oil prices rose 63 cents a barrel, to $72.03, in futures trading.
Last week’s attempted rally in technology stocks fell apart. The Nasdaq composite index dropped 45.63, or more than 2 percent, to 2164.74. Apple Computer, Yahoo and Amazon.com were among the day’s major tech losers. Microsoft dropped 57 cents, to $23.15.
Small-cap stocks fared no better. The Russell 2000 index of small-company stocks lost 18.51, or 2.5 percent, to 711.04.
New York Stock Exchange trading volume reached 1.54 billion shares, below the 2006 average daily volume of 1.69 billion shares. Nasdaq trading volume totaled 1.71 billion shares, well below the 2006 average of 2.11 billion shares.
But selling was pronounced. Losers outnumbered winners by more than a 3-1 ratio on NYSE and Nasdaq markets.
Treasury auction: Interest rates rose at the Treasury’s weekly auction of 3- and 6-month bills. The discount rate for 3-month bills was 4.72 percent, up from 4.70 percent last week. The 6-month rate was 4.84 percent, up from 4.81 last week.
The coupon-equivalent investment rates at Monday’s auction were 4.83 percent for 3-month bills and 5.03 percent for 6-month bills.
