Small-Stock Focus: Macromedia, Quixote, QRS Slide Amid Technology, Telecom Tumble
NEW YORK -- Small-capitalization stocks fell as the technology and telecommunications sectors tumbled following a wave of profit warnings and layoff announcements.</br></br>The overall Nasdaq market also slid sharply lower, with the Nasdaq Composite Index of both large and small stocks posting the steepest declines of the major stock-market measures.</br></br>Several leading tech and telecom companies let it be known that their fourth-quarter results will be weak, with several announcing job cutbacks. While most of those companies are large-caps, their roles as industry leaders causes their outlooks and action to reverberate throughout the tech and telecom sectors, which are key components of the small-cap market.</br></br>The Russell 2000 index of small-capitalization stocks fell 6.64, or 1.40%, to 468.67, and the Nasdaq composite, at 1946.51, lost 64.87, or 3.23%.</br></br>The latest round of layoff announcements and profit warnings, "are causing people to be concerned about the extent of the recession," said Alan Ackerman, market strategist at Fahnestock & Co. Stocks had run up the past few weeks on the idea that the worst of the economic downturn has passed, and that a recovery was imminent. But "it appears that the market has run too far, too fast," Mr. Ackerman said.