Bearish day on Wall St

US stocks slid as a brokerage's bearish view of the semiconductor industry hit technology shares and a key economic report raised concerns about the recovery, curbing the appetite for riskier assets.

The US dollar's gain was another headwind for stocks as it pressured prices of natural resources like crude oil and gold, pushing down shares of companies such as Alcoa and US Steel Corp.

The S&P materials index shed 2.1 percent.

Bank of America-Merrill Lynch cut its 2010 growth outlook for the semiconductor industry, and downgraded 10 stocks, including Intel Corp, Texas Instruments Inc and Marvell Technology Corp.

Dow component Intel fell 4.7 percent to $19.18, and the Philadelphia Semiconductor index dropped 3.6 percent.

The Conference Board's index of US leading economic indicators, a gauge of the US economy's prospects, rose 0.3 percent to 103.8, the highest since September 2007. But the increase fell short of Wall Street's expectation for a 0.5 percent rise.

"There's this feeling that the economy has lost momentum from the third quarter," said Bruce Zaro, chief technical strategist at Delta Global Advisors in Boston. "The market gained traction to the downside when the disappointing economic indicators came out."

The Dow Jones industrial average dropped 93.71 points, or 0.90 percent, to close unofficially at 10,332.60.

The Standard & Poor's 500 Index fell 14.90 points, or 1.34 percent, to finish unofficially at 1,094.90.

The Nasdaq Composite Index lost 36.32 points, or 1.66 percent, to close unofficially at 2,156.82..

The sell-off was broad-based, with all but three of the Dow's 30 stocks lower. Among other hard-hit sectors were financials, industrials and consumer discretionaries.

An S&P index of energy shares slid 2.5 percent as US crude futures fell $2.18, or 2.7 percent, to $77.40 a barrel. The rising greenback hurt other commodities, and Alcoa's stock lost 4.3 percent to $13.17.

Health insurance stocks fell a day after US Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid released an $849 billion healthcare reform bill that analysts said would extend coverage to tens of millions of the uninsured.

Goldman Sachs said in a note the bill may cause problems for managed-care companies regarding profit margin regulation.

The Morgan Stanley Healthcare Payor index fell 2.6 percent.

Even so, the benchmark S&P 500 is up 61.6 percent from its 12-year closing low of March 9.

- Reuters