US stock market opens down over low GDP

By Halil İbrahim Sincar

NEW YORK (AA) - U.S. stock markets opened lower Tuesday as the economy’s fourth quarter gross domestic product (GDP) growth rate failed to meet market expectation.

The Dow fell 17 points to begin trading at 20,820, and the S&P 500 lost three points to start the day at 2,365.

The Nasdaq was down 10 points to open at 5,851.

Economic growth in the fourth quarter last year stayed unchanged at 1.9 percent, the U.S. Commerce Department announced earlier Tuesday.

Markets expected the economy to expand by 2.1 percent in the final quarter of 2016.

After growing 2.6 percent in 2015, the American economy expanded by only 1.6 percent last year -- its worst annual performance since 2011.