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U.S. stocks plummeted for the second straight session, driving the S&P 500 and the Nasdaq down 6 percent on Monday in the first session since Standard & Poor's cut the nation's perfect AAA credit rating.

As the Dow Jones Industrial Average dropped more than 500 points on Monday, banking giant Bank of America saw its share price get hammered.

Call it downgradeageddon, the fear sending U.S. markets sharply lower.

The Dow lost four percent in trading mid-day Monday, while the Nasdaq and S&P lost five percent. President Barack Obama addressed downgrade Monday, but the markets dropped further after his comments.

Bank of America Corp (BAC.N) shares fell as much as 9.5 percent to their lowest level since April 2009 on Monday morning over fears of a slowing U.S. economy and challenges to a multi-billion dollar mortgage settlement.

American International Group Inc is suing Bank of America Corp to recover more than $10 billion over a "massive fraud" on mortgage debt, deepening the litigation morass facing the largest U.S. bank.

Bank of America's stock tumbled Monday, down 16 percent as investors reacted to a lawsuit filed against the bank by AIG.

Some investors, who were already jittery about the European debt crisis, and continued bad news on the US economic front, appear to have thrown in the towel.

In opening minutes of trading, the Dow Jones Industrial Average is down 1.2 percent, S&P 500 has slid 2.2 percent and Nasdaq has fallen 3.1 percent.

Stocks closed out their worst week in more than two years on Friday in a volatile session that saw the major indexes whip back and forth before the S&P 500 ended down less than a point.

A day after New York's attorney general called Bank of America Corp's $8.5 billion mortgage-backed securities settlement unfair and inadequate, another state attorney general hinted he may also oppose the deal.

Investors scrambling for cover during the U.S. deficit and debt ceiling talks and Europe's ongoing sovereign debt crisis sold stock funds and bought emerging market debt and commodities, data from EPFR showed on Friday.

U.S. bank stocks declined on Friday as investors sold off shares of some of the largest U.S. lenders amid new fears surrounding the European debt crisis and a U.S. economy showing little new growth.

Solid July job gains calmed U.S. markets on Friday, but Wall Street remained nervous among talk that the nation may be falling into a double-dip recession.

Markets remained jittery Friday even as Dow futures rose ahead of a jobs report that was slightly better than expected.

Investors fled Wall Street in the worst stock-market selloff since the middle of the financial crisis in early 2009 in what has turned into a full-fledged correction.The Dow and the S&P tumbled more than 4 percent on Thursday and the Nasdaq lost 5 percent on fear the United States is staring at another recession and that Europe's sovereign debt crisis is swallowing two of its largest economies.

Hedge fund titan John Paulson's flagship funds performed poorly in July and sank further into the red for the year.

President Barack Obama turned 50 on Thursday. But the celebration was muted by a big decline on Wall Street. Some economists are suggesting the U.S. is just "one shock" away from another recession, and questions are being peppered to Obama about his plans for turning around the U.S. economy.

The U.S. is just one-shock away from a double-dip recession, one economist says.

The U.S. sell-off follows even greater declines in Europe.

HighTower Advisors, a firm that is expanding by poaching financial advisers from the big brokerages, on Monday said it hired a private banking team from Merrill Lynch managing more than $1 billion of client assets.

Merrill Lynch, the second largest U.S. brokerage by assets and financial advisers, on Monday said it hired seven new advisers overseeing more than $800 million in combined client assets.

Interest rates on most Treasury bills fell on Monday after a tentative deal among top Washington lawmakers to raise the debt ceiling soothed anxiety of a sovereign debt default.

Bank of America was sued by 15 former Countrywide Financial institutional investors who said they lost money after being misled about the mortgage lender's financial condition and lending practices.

More than a dozen traders have quit Goldman Sachs Group Inc's (GS.N) North American government bonds and derivatives trading desk in New York in recent months as the bank takes fewer risks and big bonuses for ambitious traders dry up.

comScore Media Metrix released its list of top 50 web properties for June with Google, Yahoo! and Microsoft sites assuming top positions. However social networking sites like Facebook, online luxury magazines like Glam Media, sports and entertainment sites like Turner Digital and Viacom seem to be gaining in popularity. American web users show a marked trend towards networking, shopping, sports and entertainment.

Most financial advisers are holding a lot of hands this week. Many of their clients, with the horrors of the financial crisis so fresh, are getting scared by the possibility of a United States' debt default.

Dunkin' Brands (DNKN.O) has raised $422.75 million after pricing its IPO at $19 per share, well above the range set by underwriters, signaling strong demand for this week's biggest deal.

President Barack Obama's Democrats and their Republican rivals were further apart than ever on Tuesday in an impasse over the government's debt limit as investors braced for a looming default and downgrade.