Losing streak continues for Wall St.

NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- Despite some signs of strength from the financials and a dip in the price of crude oil, stocks could not stage a rebound from last week's brutal selloff, ending lower for the fourth straight session.

The Dow Jones industrial average (Charts) lost 0.4 percent based on early tallies.

The broader S&P 500 index (Charts) slipped 1 percent, while the tech-fueled Nasdaq (Charts) bucked the trend, losing nearly 0.7 percent.

Light, sweet crude for December fell 77 cents to $93.85 a barrel in afternoon trading on the New York Mercantile Exchange.

Gold prices tumbled after last week's big run-up, as COMEX gold for December fell $27 to $807.70 an ounce.

The dollar rebounded against the euro but was lower versus the yen.

Stocks pulled back from their session highs Monday afternoon after getting a lift from investors looking for bargains after last week's brutal selloff.

Shares of the embattled banks showed some resilience in Monday trading, despite reports of forthcoming writedowns from British banking giant HSBC (Charts). Citigroup (Charts, Fortune 500) shares gained 1.5 percent while Goldman Sachs (Charts, Fortune 500) stocks climbed nearly 2 percent.

While the uptick in financials was a pretty good indicator that credit fears were easing, investors remain fully focused on any new developments in the credit markets, said Anthony Conroy, head trader at BNY Brokerage, keeping a lid on stock gains.

"Nervousness is pretty rampant on the street right now over this subprime issue and that doesn't go away overnight," he said.

Last week, those fears, which were sparked after a round of writedowns from Wall Street's biggest banks, sent the 30-stock Dow industrials tumbling 4.1 percent, while the S&P fell 3.7 percent and the Nasdaq dropped 6.9 percent.

With no economic reports slated for release Monday and the Treasury market closed for the Veterans Day holiday, investors were focused on the corporate front.

Shares of E-Trade Financial Corp. (Charts) plunged 59 percent Monday on the New York Stock Exchange after it warned late on Friday that the deteriorating value of its mortgage-backed securities may force it to take significant writedowns in the fourth quarter.

Blackstone Group (Charts) posted a net loss in the most recent quarter Monday, hurt by compensation charges. Blackstone shares slipped over 8 percent on the news, even though it reported higher revenue in its core private equity business, helped by higher fees.

International Business Machines (Charts, Fortune 500) announced Monday it agreed to purchase the business software maker Cognos Inc. (Charts) for about $5 billion.

Tyson Foods (Charts, Fortune 500), the world's largest meat processor, turned a profit in its quarterly results, helped by cost-cutting measures. But shares of the company fell 6 percent after it issued forecasts below analysts' expectations.

Market breadth was negative. Losers beat winners by 2 to 1 on the New York Stock Exchange on volume of 1.7 billion shares. Advancers edged out decliners on the Nasdaq as 2.81 billion shares exchanged hands.