U.S. stocks slid on Monday on more evidence the year-long recession will keep eating into corporate profits. Meanwhile, retailers tumbled on worries the holiday shopping season could be the worst in nearly 40 years.

But all three major indexes finished well off their session lows. Trading was thin for most of the session and was expected to be light throughout the holiday-shortened week.

With just six trading days remaining in the year, there is little hope the markets will avoid having their worst yearly performance since the 1930s. Analysts say market jitters centered on uncertainty over how deep and how long a global recession would be.

(CCTV December 24, 2008)