DAVOS-KLOSTERS/SWITZERLAND, 29JAN09 - NASDAQ CEO Bob Greifeld (centre R) and EU Comissioner for Economic and Monetary Affairs Joaquin Almunia (centre L) ring the opening bell for the NYSE Nasdaq outside the congress centre during the Annual Meeting 2009 of the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, January 29, 2009.

US stocks fell Thursday on economic worries.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 147 points, or 1.70%, to 8,228. Citigroup and Bank of America dropped about 5%.

The Nasdaq Composite Index and the S&P 500 fell 2.15% and 2.06%.

The Ford Motor Co. in the fourth quarter, posted a net loss of $5.9 billion, or $2.46 a share, as its full-year loss jumped to $14.6 billion compared with $2.72 billion for 2007.

Ford has $13.4 billion cash on hand to get it through 2009.

The share price fell 2.5%.

New US home sales plunged in December to the lowest level since 1982.

Separately, weekly jobless claims rose 3,000 to 588,000, as continuing claims hit a record 4,776,000. Durable-goods orders dropped 2.6%.

Sales of single-family homes decreased by 14.7% to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 331,000, the Commerce Department said today.

Ted Wieseman of Morgan Stanley commented: "With home prices having plunged and mortgage rates come down substantially, housing affordability has surged to all-time record highs by a wide margin. A key problem for homebuilders, however, has been the flood of foreclosed homes hitting the market at very low prices that they have great difficulty competing with. These fire sale priced existing homes do seem to be selling — existing home sales rose 6.5% in December, with the NAR (National Association of Realtors) indicating that a substantial portion of the months’ activity was distressed sales."

Finfacts Reports:

Top bond fund manger Bill Gross says to end "this deflationary delevering and mini-depression" -- stop the ongoing decline in asset prices

US sales of new one-family houses in December fell to annual rate of 331,000 - - the lowest since 1982; US jobless claims jump to record high

Live US Indices

European stocks fell Thursday and the Dow Jones Stoxx 600 Index fell 1.8%.

National benchmarks dropped in all of the 18 Western European markets except Luxemburg and Portugal today. The UK’s FTSE 100 dipped 2.4%; France’s CAC 40 slid 1.8% and Germany’s DAX slipped 1.7%.

In Dublin, the ISEQ dropped 5%.

AIB Bank and IL&P dipped 18%; BoI 19% ; Aer Lingus dropped 8% and Independent News and Media lost 19%.