US stock market opens lower ending rally

By Ovunc Kutlu

ANKARA (AA) - US stock exchanges opened lower on Monday with significant losses, ending their strong rally recorded last week.

The Dow Jones was down 220 points, or 0.62%, to 35,074. Last week, the blue-chip index posted a weekly gain of 1.57%, recording its largest weekly increase since June.

The S&P 500 fell 16 points, or 0.36%, to 4,455. It increased 1.82% last week, posting its best performance since July.

The Nasdaq declined 22 points, or 0.15%, to 14,875 at 9.44 a.m. EDT. The tech-heavy index jumped 2.17% last week.

As investors' sentiment turned to negative, the VIX volatility index, known as the fear index, was up 6% to 17.28.

The dollar index was almost at 93.96, while the yield on 10-year US Treasury notes rose 2.1% to 1.610%.

Oil prices were on the rise again with international benchmark Brent crude trading at $85.45 with a 0.7% gain, and US benchmark West Texas Intermediate was at $82.64 -- a 1.1% increase.

Precious metals were down with gold losing 0.14% to $1,765 per ounce and silver trimming 0.8% to $23.10.

After hitting $60,000 on Friday for the first time in six months, since April 18, price of Bitcoin was trading around $61,300 for a 0.6% gain.