Stocks drop as hope for a budget deal slips away
NEW YORK -- Stocks are dropping again on Wall Street as investors lose hope that Washington will meet a self-imposed deadline for reaching a budget deal by year-end.
The five-day losing streak for the Dow Jones industrial average was the longest since July.
The Dow lost 158 points to close at 12,938 Friday.
The Standard & Poor 500 index fell 15 points to 1,402 and the Nasdaq dropped 25 points to 2,960.
The market was down all day. The losses accelerated in the final 20 minutes of trading as reports circulated that President Barack Obama would not make a new budget proposal in a meeting with congressional leaders.
Two stocks fell for every one that rose on the New York Stock Exchange. Volume was lower than the recent average at 2.4 billion shares.
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