U.S. stocks tumble on first day after credit cut

The Standard and Poor's building in New York, August 2, 2011. The U.S. Treasury Friday night hit back against a Standard and Poor's downgrade of U.S. top-notch credit rating, saying that the agency's judgment was flawed. (Xinhua/Reuters Photo)

NEW YORK, Aug. 8 (Xinhua) -- The Wall Street opened broadly lower on Monday, the first trading day after Standard & Poor's downgraded U.S. triple-A credit rating, with the NASDAQ and The Standard & Poor's 500 tumbling over 2 percent.

The Dow Jones industrial average lost 219.37 points, or 1.92 percent, to 11,225.24. The Standard & Poor's 500 was down 24.59 points, or 2.05 percent, to 1,174.75. The Nasdaq Composite Index dropped 54.92 points, or 2.17 percent, to 2,477.49.

The Dow were down over 200 points after the opening bell but struggled back for a while. Then another round of sell-off pushed the blue-chip index dropped over 200 points again.

It seemed that investors had no more options but to sell the stocks. Reflecting the panic mood, safe-haven asset gold soared above 1,700 dollars an ounce for the first time on Monday.

Even the positive news from European failed to stop the sell-off.

The European Central Bank pushed a dramatic intervention in bond markets, driving the yields of Spanish and Italian bonds down sharply