Stocks fall after Bhutto assassination

NEW YORK — Wall Street skidded Thursday after the assassination of Pakistani opposition leader Benazir Bhutto and after the Commerce Department's durable-goods report exacerbated concerns about the U.S. economy.

The Dow Jones industrial average fell 192.08 to 13,359.61.

Microsoft, one of the 30 Dow stocks, fell 64 cents to close at $35.97 a share. Boeing, also a Dow stock, tumbled $1.12 to $88.88.

Broader stock indicators also fell. The Standard & Poor's 500 index declined 21.39 to 1,476.27, and the Nasdaq composite index fell 47.62 to 2,676.79.

Bhutto's assassination raised the possibility of increasing political unrest abroad, always an unsettling prospect for investors who have already been contending with domestic economic concerns for months. Oil prices rose following the news, and that unwelcome inflationary trend only added to Wall Street's uneasiness.

Meanwhile, the government said orders for durable goods — big-ticket items from commercial jetliners to home appliances — rose by just 0.1 percent last month. Economists had been looking for a rise of 2.2 percent. Still, November saw the first rise in durable-goods orders in the past four months.

The Labor Department said the number of workers seeking unemployment benefits showed a surprising increase last week. Applications filed for unemployment insurance rose by a seasonally adjusted 1,000 to 349,000. Economists had expecting the figure would fall to around 340,000 for last week.

In a bright spot, the Conference Board said its Consumer Confidence Index advanced to 88.6 in December from a revised 87.8 in November. It was the first increase since July and Wall Street had expected a slight drop.

Consumer spending represents about two-thirds of economic activity in the United States.