GE results slam markets

By Herbert Lash

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Wall Street stocks skidded on Friday after disappointing earnings at General Electric Co jolted investors who had hoped a U.S. slowdown would be mild and sent them scurrying to the safety of government debt.

The slide pulled European shares down as well, though Asian markets closed higher before the U.S. news hit.

The dollar fell broadly as GE's results and lowered outlook for 2008 -- along with a worse-than-expected slide in consumer confidence -- undermined a view that the worst of a credit crisis that has battered markets for months might be over.

Oil steadied after an earlier decline as supply concerns and the weak dollar countered expectations that slowing economic growth will reduce global demand this year.

GE shares slumped more than 13 percent, their worst decline since the stock market crash of October 1987. The conglomerate, viewed as an economic bellwether because of the range of its businesses, reported an unexpected 6 percent decline in first-quarter earnings and lowered its forecast for 2008.

In another sign of a bleak economy, U.S. consumer confidence in early April fell to its lowest since 1982, diving deeper into recessionary territory on heightened worries over inflation and jobs, according to the Reuters/University of Michigan Surveys of Consumers.

Euro zone government bond futures staged their biggest one-day percentage rise in a month on renewed flight-to-safety flows and U.S. Treasury debt prices rose sharply after the GE results and dismal reading of consumer confidence.

"These results confirm that the slowdown is widespread and beginning to impact (capital expenditures) and longer-cycle businesses," said Stephen Surpless, senior analyst at Cantor Fitzgerald in London.