"March 14 (Bloomberg) -- U.S. stocks plunged for the third day this week after Bear Stearns Cos. required a bailout from the Federal Reserve and JPMorgan Chase & Co. to avoid collapse.
Bear Stearns, the second-largest underwriter of U.S. mortgage bonds, tumbled the most ever after the brokerage said its liquidity deteriorated in the past day. The announcement overwhelmed economic reports that showed inflation ground to a halt and consumer confidence unexpectedly rose.
``The real problem is the uncertainty,'' said John Kattar, who oversees about $2 billion as chief investment officer at Eastern Investment Advisors in Boston. ``The fact that the issue is so serious that the New York Fed directly has to intervene demonstrates that there are pretty big problems here with pretty big uncertainties.''
Never good.
