Wall Street Opens Sharply Lower on Fresh Inflation, Growth Fears By

© Reuters

By Geoffrey Smith 

-- U.S. stock markets opened sharply lower on Monday as investors adopted a cautious stance at the start of a week that will culminate in the Federal Reserve's annual central banking symposium on Friday.

By 09:40 ET (13:40 GMT), the Dow Jones Industrial Average was down 408 points, or 1.2%, at 32,299 points. The S&P 500 was also down by 1.4% and the Nasdaq Composite was down by 1.5%.

The move was driven, in part, by a rise in shorter-dated bond yields, where market participants moved to price in higher average interest rates over the next five years. U.S. 5-year note yields hit their highest in a month as hopes for a quick end to the Fed's policy tightening cycle weakened.

Among early movers, meme stock AMC Entertainment (NYSE:AMC) plummeted 34% as its new form of preferred shares started trading, in a move that will sharply dilute the existing class of stock. AMC, which reported a net loss of $120 million in its last quarter, had resorted to issuing the shares to shore up its balance sheet after failing to get stockholder approval for issuing new ordinary stock.

Fellow meme stock Bed Bath & Beyond (NASDAQ:BBBY) continued its recent volatile path, spiking at the open before reversing to be down 6.3% on a report that certain product suppliers had stopped shipping to it due to payment delays. Netflix stock also fell 5.3% after brokers CFRA downgraded it to Sell, saying its recent recovery had gone far enough. 

Signify Health (NYSE:SGFY) shot in the other direction, rising 38% after reports that Amazon (NASDAQ:AMZN) has joined the race to buy the at-home healthcare company. 

Oil and gas companies came under pressure as crude oil prices tumbled more than 4% on fears about what a recession would do to global demand. Occidental Petroleum (NYSE:OXY) stock fell 4.4%, while Exxon Mobil (NYSE:XOM) stock fell 2.2% and Chevron (NYSE:CVX) stock fell 1.9%.

 

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