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The deceleration in real GDP in the first quarter primarily reflected decelerations in private inventory investment and in exports, a downturn in residential fixed investment, and a larger decrease in state and local government spending that were partly offset by an acceleration in PCE and a deceleration in imports.

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Real final sales of domestic product -- GDP less change in private inventories -- increased 1.6 percent in the first quarter, compared with an increase of 1.7 percent in the fourth.

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A weeklong rout in stocks deepened, with U.S. benchmark indexes losing the most in more than a year, as reports cast doubts about the strength of the economic recovery and European leaders struggled to contain the region’s debt crisis. Commodities plunged and Treasuries soared.

The Standard & Poor’s 500 Index sank 3.9 percent to 1,071.59 at 4 p.m. in New York, its biggest drop since April 2009. The Stoxx Europe 600 Index lost 2.2 percent and the S&P GSCI Index of commodities tumbled to the lowest since October. The losses accelerated even as the euro rallied as much as 1.5 percent to $1.2598 after earlier flirting with a four-year low. Ten-year Treasury yields slid to the lowest level of the year, down 15 basis points at 3.22 percent. The yen rallied against all 16 major counterparts.

Tomorrow’s expiration of U.S. stock options and progress on a financial-reform bill may have added to volatility after U.S. jobless claims unexpectedly increased to 471,000 last week and the Conference Board’s index of leading economic indicators posted a surprise drop of 0.1 percent. The slide came a day before the German parliament votes on the country’s share of a $1 trillion bailout to halt a worsening sovereign debt crisis.

“Put your helmets on if you are long risk here,” Nicolas Lenoir, chief market strategist at ICAP Futures LLC in Jersey City, New Jersey, said in a note to clients before markets opened today. “A lot of stops have been triggered when the S&P future crossed 1,100 and anybody still long will probably have to bail out and head for cover.”

S&P 500 Correction

Gauges of financial, industrial and commodity companies tumbled more than 4.4 percent each to lead declines in all 10 of the S&P 500’s main industry groups. Bank of America Corp., Alcoa Inc. and General Electric Co. dropped more than 5.7 percent as all 30 stocks in the Dow Jones Industrial Average fell, dragging the gauge down 376.36 points, or 3.6 percent, to 10,068.01 for its biggest tumble since March 5, 2009. Both the S&P 500 and Dow closed at their lowest levels since Feb. 10.

Today’s plunge in stocks came as the Securities and Exchange Commission continues its autopsy of the chain reaction of selling that briefly erased $1 trillion in stock value on May 6. Kentucky Republican Senator Jim Bunning and Virginia Democrat Mark Warner today said at a committee hearing that they were concerned the so-called flash crash could be repeated.

‘Question of Confidence’

“It’s a question of confidence,” said Jack Ablin, chief investment officer at Chicago-based Harris Private Bank, which oversees $55 billion. The almost 1,000-point decline in the Dow average on May 6 “not only rattled the confidence of investors, but every day policymakers are digging in and not giving us answers as to what’s causing this problem.”

At 1,071.59, the S&P 500 is 24 percent below its level 10 years ago, just after the peak of the Internet bubble. The index is 17 percent below its level on May 18, 2001, and 3 percent above its closing price on the first trading day after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorism attacks.
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In one respect, Mrs Merkel is right: "The euro is in danger… if the euro fails, then Europe fails." What she has not yet admitted publicly is that the main cause of the single currency's peril appears beyond her control and therefore her impetuous response to its crisis of confidence is doomed to fail.

The euro has many flaws, but its weakest link is Greece, whose fundamental problem is that for years it spent too much, earned too little and plugged the gap by borrowing in order to enjoy a rich man's lifestyle. It flouted EU rules on the limits to budget deficits; its national accounts were a moussaka of minced statistics, topped with a cheesy sauce of jiggery-pokery.

By any legitimate measure, Greece was unworthy of eurozone membership. That it achieved card-carrying status was down to the sleight-of-hand skills of its Brussels fixers and the acquiescence of central bank bean-counters. Now we know the truth, jet-hosing it with yet more debt makes no sense. Another dose of funny money will delay but not extinguish the need for austerity.

This is why the euro, in its current form, is finished. The game is up for a monetary union that was meant to bolt together work-and-save citizens in northern Europe with the party animals of Club Med. No amount of pit props from Berlin can save the euro Mk I from collapsing under the weight of its structural dysfunctionality. You cannot run indefinitely a single currency with one interest rate for 16 economies, when there are such huge fiscal disparities.

What was once deemed unthinkable is now, I believe, inevitable: withdrawal from the eurozone of one or more of its member countries. At the bottom end, Greece and Portugal are favourites to be forced out through weakness. At the top end, proposals are already being floated in the Frankfurt press for a new "hard currency" zone, led by Germany, Austria and the Benelux countries. Either way, rich and poor are heading in opposite directions.
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A total of 775 banks, or one-tenth of all U.S. banks, were on the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp.'s list of "problem" institutions in the first quarter, as bad loans in the commercial real-estate market weighed on bank balance sheets.

Poor loan performance in other sectors also continued to hurt banks, with the total number of loans at least three months past due climbing for the 16th consecutive quarter, FDIC officials said in a briefing on Thursday.

"The banking system still has many problems to work through, and we cannot ignore the possibility of more financial market volatility," FDIC Chairman Sheila Bair said.

There were 702 on the FDIC's "problem" bank list at the end of 2009 and 252 at the end of 2008.

FDIC officials said they expected the number of failed banks to peak this year after climbing steadily over the past three years. Regulators have shut 72 banks so far this year, more than double the number closed by this time last year. Ms. Bair said regulators were preparing for a steady pace of additional closures through the end of the year. A total of 237 banks have failed since the beginning of 2008.

The failures continue to strain the FDIC's fund to protect consumer deposits, although officials signaled they were confident they had enough cash on hand to deal with the expected spate of failures, without having to assess new fees on the banking industry. The agency's deposit insurance fund stood at negative-$20.7 billion at the end of the first quarter, a slight improvement from the end of 2009.
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