Santa or Scrooge? Holidays Worry Investors
WITH LESS than a month left to the year, the question for investors is whether they should be singing "Deck the Halls" or worrying that the economy is about to get decked.</br></br>Stocks fell for the second week in a row and Treasury yields dropped to their lowest level in more than 10 months, after reports from the malls suggested that holiday shopping over the Thanksgiving weekend wasn't as strong as investors had hoped and a closely watched manufacturing gauge unexpectedly fell.</br></br>"Clearly, the focus here is on underlying economic weakness," said hedge-fund manager Seth Tobias, general partner at the Circle T family of funds.</br></br>The Dow Jones Industrial Average ended Friday down 27.80 points, or 0.2%, to 12194.13, after falling as much as 120 points during the day. The Institute for Supply Management said its manufacturing index slipped to 49.5 in November -- its lowest level in more than three years -- from 51.2 in October. Anything below 50 represents contracting manufacturing activity.</br></br>The Dow fell 86.04 points, or 0.7%, for the week but is still up 14% for the year.