European debt concerns continued to plague investors sending the markets down to a lower close on a shortened trading day with the Dow tumbling 95 points to 11,092. Nasdaq fell 8 points to 2534.
On the upside
Shares of Monster Worldwide (NYSE: MWW) continued climbing after the Labor Department reported a drop in jobless claims on Wednesday.
Rising tensions on the Korean peninsula lifted shares Uranium Resources (Nasdaq: URRE).
DigiTimes reported that Apple (Nasdaq: AAPL) increased production of the iPad at the Foxxconn Shenzhen manufacturing plant.
On the downside
Standard & Poor's downgraded Allied Irish Banks (NYSE: AIB) and The Governor and Company of The Bank of Ireland (NYSE: IRE).
Borders Group (NYSE: BGP) heavily discounted its e-readers in order to boost sales but investors worried that the steep price cuts will hurt profits.
National Bank of Greece (NYSE: NBG) fell over renewed concerns about European debt.
In the broad market, declining issues outpaced advancers by a margin of more than 2 to 1 on the NYSE and by 5 to 3 on Nasdaq. The Russell 2000 which tracks small cap stocks lost 3 points to 732.
