US stocks fall on credit downgrades, Greek talks

NEW YORK: US stocks clawed back early sharp losses on S&P's downgrade of France and new worries over Greece Friday, but still ended the day in the red.

At the closing bell the Dow Jones Industrial Average was down 49.04 points (0.39 percent) at 12,421.98.

The broad-based S&P 500 lost 6.41 percent (0.49 percent) to 1,289.09, while the tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite gave up 14.03 (0.51 percent) to end at 2,710.67.

Earlier losses on each of the indices topped one percent as credit downgrades for a swathe of European countries were imminent and after banks negotiating with Greece to write off some of its debt said talks had broken down.