Dow Sinks 514 on Bad Earnings

Stocks continued yesterday’s decline amid a wave of poor earnings reports across the board, the Wall Street Journal reports. The Dow, down at one point nearly 700 points in the final hour, fell 514.45 to close at 8,519.21. The Nasdaq shed 80.93 points, closing at 1,615.75, and the S&P 500 slid 58.27 points to 896.78, its lowest close in 5 years.

Boeing shares fell 9.2% after it announced that the machinists strike cut earnings by 38%, and Merck's fell 7.2% after a 28% profit decline. Even strong earners were hit by the depressed climate: AT&T declined 8.5% despite posting a 5% rise in profit. The earnings season will continue as Amazon posts its results this evening.
(More Dow Jones stories.)