Dow tumbles
127 with bonds

NEW YORK -- The Dow Jones industrial average fell more than 125 points today, its fifth straight triple-digit swing, as rising interest rates derailed the stock market's bid at a rapid recovery from this month's downturn.

The Dow fell 127.28 points to close at 7,893.95, ending an unprecedented three-day streak of 100-point gains that had erased Friday's 247-point slide.

Decliners beat advancers by more than a 2-to-1 margin on the New York Stock Exchange, with 911 up, 1,936 down and 541 unchanged. NYSE volume was 497.56 million shares vs. 518.15 million yesterday.

Most broad-market indicators, many of which had already surged about 4 percent this week, also retreated sharply. The Standard & Poor's 500 list fell 14.31 to 925.04, and the NYSE index fell 5.94 to 479.76. The Nasdaq index dropped 21.34 to 1,607.36, and the American Stock Exchange composite retreated 0.20 to 646.56.

Stocks were pressured from the open by a weak bond market, where interest rates rose despite a report offering some reassurance that employment costs -- a key force behind inflation -- aren't spinning out of control.

The Labor Department reported that the number of first-time claims for jobless benefits shot up by 20,000 last week to 337,000. The jump was the third straight advance since claims hit a 23-year low of 275,000 during the week ended July 26.

The price of the Treasury's main 30-year bond was off 27/32 point while its yield rose to 6.6 percent from 6.54 percent late yesterday.