Plunging Dollar Rattles Wall Street

Stocks retreated Tuesday as the dollar’s profound weakness troubled investors, but some market analysts shrugged off the setback on Wall Street.

Selling of equities intensified while the dollar plunged to untested depths against the Japanese yen and German mark. The stock slide grew severe enough at one point to trigger curbs on certain computer-guided program trading on the New York Stock Exchange.

All the popular stock market measures managed to bounce off their bottoms of the day but still ended down sharply. The Dow Jones industrial average lost 34.93 to close at 3,962.63.

Losers held a commanding majority on the NYSE advance-decline roster; the closing Big Board tally showed 604 stocks up, 1,682 down and 658 unchanged.

Volume on the NYSE floor swelled to 355.53 million shares as of 4 p.m. Eastern time from 298.86 million Monday.

Bond prices slumped and interest rates rose as the dollar tumbled against its Japanese and German counterparts. Selling in the bond market spilled over into stocks and market analysts said investors seized the opportunity to take stock profits amassed during recent advances.

Some of the stocks that moved substantially or traded heavily Tuesday:

NYSE

Barrick Gold, up 1 1/2 to 23 1/4.

The dollar’s slump drove investors to seek refuge in gold and precious metals stocks. Other active NYSE gold issues were: Placer Dome, up 1 5/8 to 21 7/8; Homestake, up 1 3/8 to 17 1/4; Battle Mountain Gold, up 1/2 to 10 1/4; and Newmont Mining, up 3 to 40 5/8.

Glaxo, up 1/2 to 21 5/8.

American depository receipts of the Britain-based drug company were active as Wellcome announced its surrender to Glaxo, clearing the way for a merger that will create the world’s largest drug maker.

NASDAQ

Microsoft, up 1 1-32 to 65 11-32.

The software company decided against selling its package of word processing, spreadsheet and other programs in combination with the new version of its popular Windows later this year.

AMEX

Royal Oak Mines, up 3-16 to 3 5-16.

Stocks of precious metals mining companies attracted investors as gold rallied in response to the dollar’s weakness. Also active on the American exchange, Echo Bay rose 7/8 to 9 7/8 and Pegasus Gold rose 5/8 to 11 1/4.