Pre-market trading halted due to rapid decline of global markets

[RightIsWrong]

To try to head off the massive sell off of the big boys at the expense of the small traders, pre-market trading was halted this morning.

This comes after Dana Perino, aka "Teh Hotness" said in a press conference that all of the economic indicators coming out in the next week are going to be pretty horrible.

Not good news for the markets of most 401k's.

WaPo

U.S. stocks plummeted at the opening bell this morning after global markets plunged and investors absorbed poor corporate profit data that strongly indicates a global recession is taking shape.

Pre-market trading this morning indicated the U.S. markets would brace for a sell off. Pre-trading on the Standard & Poor's 500 index fell by so much that pre-market trading was halted.

The New York Stocks Exchange halts trading for limited amounts of time when losses reach pre-set levels-- a 10 percent in most cases.

In the opening minutes of trading, the Dow Jones industrial average is down more than 5 percent, or 450 points, while the broader Standards & Poor's 500 was down 5 percent, or 45 points. The tech-heavy Nasdaq was down 5 percent, or 85 points.

The big drop in futures trading is foreshadowing a miserable day in trading and raises the risk that a sell off could reach the point that regular trading would be halted. Investors have grown increasingly unnerved by a series of poor earnings reports and that the financial crisis would weigh down corporate profits into 2009. That fear has overshadowed signs that government efforts to stem the financial crisis and encourage banks to lend to each other are beginning to work.

Wall Street appears set to follow overseas markets into a major sell off. The FTSE in London is down 8 percent, while the Dax in Germany fell 9 percent. Things are also dour in Asia. The Nikkei in Japan is down 9.6 percent.

 

[GTKeeper]

Puts on C, HBC, SOV are keeping me afloat here luckily.

 

[NoStateofMind]

Well the bailout just proved to be shit like we thought all along. Markets crashing all over as much as 10%. Fox (no surprise) is already pumping up a story to have $300 billion more infused into the market sighting that the previous $700 billion effects have worn off. :roll:

Come on in "experts" and tell us how many more bailouts we need and what effect it will have. Fools.

 

[StageLeft]

Come on in "experts" and tell us how many more bailouts we need and what effect it will have. Fools.

The bailout has helped credit, from what I can tell, lending rates are down and that was its intent. It cannot help the stock market.

That said, using the market as a bellwether of the future and indicator of its current health, which is generally a relatively reasonable thing to do, we currently see the equivalent of an economic pearl harbor and to answer your question on how many bailouts we need, we won't know until it's solved. My personal wish is for a big multi hundred B bailout every two months or so until we solve this problem. And that's a joke, btw.