Retreat at Wall St. openU.S. stocks lower, with techs pacing decline, as investors fret about Merrill, housing sector.NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- U.S. stocks retreated at Wednesday's open after Merrill Lynch took a larger-than-expected writedown, leading to more concern about the housing sector. The Dow Jones industrial average dipped 0.2 percent. The tech-heavy Nasdaq composite index slipped by 0.9 percent. The Standard & Poor's 500 index lost 0.4 percent. Among stocks in the news Wednesday: Merrill Lynch (Charts, Fortune 500), Boeing (Charts, Fortune 500), General Dynamics (Charts, Fortune 500), Children's Place (Charts), BP (Charts) and ConocoPhillips (Charts, Fortune 500). |
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