Wall Street Rally Falls Through

A rally on Wall Street faded in the final hour of trading Monday as traders fretted over what the next revelation will be in the global credit market meltdown.

Stocks were up early after a Goldman Sachs hedge fund bailout and more global central bank monetary interventions. The Nasdaq opened near its high for the day and spent the rest of the day on the defensive, but the Dow didn’t succumb to selling until the last hour of trading.

Still, some notable technology names scored big gains.

EMC surged 7.5% a day ahead of its VMware IPO, while HP gained 2.6% ahead of its earnings report due out late Thursday.

Sirenza rose 8.5% on a buyout deal with RF Micro .

Photon Dynamics was a big earnings gainer, while BEA , EDS , Monster and Websense climbed on upgrades.

SCO tumbled on a big legal setback in its long-running dispute with Novell .

On Tuesday and Wednesday, investors will be watching the latest government inflation data, while Applied Materials will report earnings Tuesday night.

The Nasdaq fell 2 to 2542, the S&P 500 slipped 1 to 1452, and the Dow lost 3 to 13,236. Volume declined to 3.63 billion shares on the NYSE, and 2.21 billion on the Nasdaq. Declining issues led by a few shares on the NYSE, and by a 16-14 margin on the Nasdaq. Upside volume was 51% on the NYSE, and 51% on the Nasdaq. New highs-new lows were 21-229 on the NYSE, and 52-118 on the Nasdaq.