U.S. stocks slid, with the Standard & Poor’s 500 Index falling below its 2010 closing low, after a gauge of consumer confidence trailed economists’ estimates and concern grew that growth is slowing in China. Alcoa Inc., the largest U.S. aluminum maker, fell 3.9 percent as the Conference Board revised its April gauge for the outlook of China’s economy to indicate slower growth. JPMorgan Chase & Co. slipped 2.5 percent after Moody’s Investors Service said the bank may face lost revenue from a cap on debit fees. The S&P 500 sank 2.4 percent to 1,048.35 as of 10:16 a.m. in New York, below its lowest closing level since November 2009. The Dow Jones Industrial Average dropped 240.25 points, or 2.4 percent, to 9,898.27. Ten stocks fell for each that rose on U.S. exchanges. “It was shocking to me” that consumer confidence would be so low, said Randy Bateman, chief investment officer at Huntington Asset Management in Columbus, Ohio, which oversees $13.5 billion. “The consumer is still grappling with the fact that they have not saved enough and that joblessness is giving people concern about future prospects that we might go into a double dip.” The Conference Board’s index of confidence among U.S. consumers slumped to 52.9 this month from a revised 62.7 in May as Americans became pessimistic about the outlook for the labor market and the economy, figures from the New York-based private research group showed today. The median forecast called for a decline to 62.5, and the gauge was lower than all projections in a Bloomberg News survey of 71 economists. Home Prices Rise Home prices in 20 U.S. cities rose in April from a year earlier as sales got a boost from a tax credit aimed at reviving the industry that triggered the worst recession since the 1930s. The S&P/Case-Shiller index of property values climbed 3.8 percent from April 2009, the biggest year-over-year gain since September 2006. The increase exceeded the median forecast of economists surveyed by Bloomberg News. The S&P 500 has tumbled 14 percent from this year’s high on April 23 on concern a sovereign-debt crisis in Europe and China’s moves to slow the world’s largest emerging economy will dent global growth. The Conference Board today revised its April leading economic index for China to 0.3 percent, from a gain of 1.7 percent reported June 15. Alcoa slid 3.9 percent to $10.60 on concern demand from China may weaken. Freeport-McMoRan Copper & Gold Inc., the world’s biggest publicly traded copper producer, dropped 4.2 percent to $61.95. China Export ‘Headwinds’ China’s exports face “strong headwinds” in the second half of the year from policy tightening measures and the European debt crisis, reducing prospects of a rebound in the stock market, Citigroup Inc. said in a report obtained yesterday. “China growth is ebbing,” said Jack Ablin, chief investment officer at Chicago-based Harris Private Bank, which oversees $55 billion. “If that’s the engine the world is looking at to pull us out of the doldrums then there’s been a disappointing number and disappointment there.” The Shanghai Composite Index retreated 4.3 percent to 2,427.05 today, the biggest drop since May 17 and the lowest close in 14 months. JPMorgan, the bank headed by Jamie Dimon, dropped 2.5 percent to $37.56. The second-biggest U.S. bank by assets, along with Bank of America Corp. and Wells Fargo & Co., may lose $1.38 billion in annual revenue from the proposed cap on credit-card swipe fees being considered by the U.S. Congress, Moody’s said in a report. Bank of America fell 3 percent to $14.79. Wells Fargo slumped 2.8 percent to $26.27. Micron Technology Inc. sank 12 percent to $8.81 even after the largest U.S. maker of computer-memory chips posted a third- quarter net income of $939 million on one-time accounting gains. The company “reported modestly better-than-expected fiscal third-quarter results,” wrote UBS AG analysts in a report. “Despite this, we believe stable to declining price trends over the past month could be a precursor to further declines.” To contact the reporter on this story: Kelly Bit in New York at kbit@bloomberg.net.

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