Today's dip was probably due more to a technical selling fiasco than any particular major market broad news driving us lower, although all bad news took us lower after the overseas markets took a pounding. We are at well over 10-year lows in stocks and you can see Tattoo from Fantasy Island getting his introduction wrong yelling out, "Boss! The Pain! The Pain!". Even the last line defensive stock list got hammered today. Here are today's unofficial closing bell levels:
Dow 6,762.98 -299.95 (-4.25%)
S&P 500 700.83 -34.26 (-4.66%)
Nasdaq 1,322.85 -54.99 (-3.99%)
Top Analyst UPGRADES and Top Analyst DOWNGRADES
Berkshire Hathaway Inc. (NYSE: BRK.A) took a pounding today. Warren Buffett gave the most cautious sounding Annual Report letter this weekend. He is still bearish too, and his shares fell again. The stock was down over 5% at $74,600.00 right before the close.
American International Group, Inc. (NYSE: AIG) was up over 7% late in the day at $0.45 after the government threw another $30 billion at the rescue of the company. This was after a record quarterly loss in US history as writedowns and items slammed the company.
Bank of America Corp. (NYSE: BAC) was down almost 6% at $3.72 shortly before the close. But shares had been down as low as $3.27 today. Ken Lewis told the FT that his bank has been improperly classified as a Citi-like bank because it took more money to stabilize that acquisition of Merrill Lynch.
General Electric Company (NYSE: GE) was hit today along with other financial stocks and as the sellers kept pounding it. The stock was down 11% at $7.57 right before the close. Insiders bought over 100,000 shares of stock today and that didn't even help.
Reliant Energy Inc. (NYSE: RRI) posted a loss rather than a gain, and now that it is selling the retail Texas electric operations it may have just jumped into a full blown merger war on the news that could tie the company up for quite some time. Shares were down 14% at $2.97 right before the close.
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