Market Close: Dow, techs lose ground

Falling bond prices and interest-rate jitters pushed U.S. stocks lower Thursday as the Dow Jones industrial average plunged 132 points to 10,534.83 and the Nasdaq composite fell 44 points to end at 2,554.00.

"The song remains the same. The doomsday bond vigilantes are playing for the worst-case scenario and equities are following," said Bryan Piskorowski, market analyst at Prudential Securities.

Bond prices fell, sending the yield on the Treasury's long bond to a 20-month high.

Chip stocks were roughed up on shaky earnings news from Micron Technology Inc. (MU) and Advanced Micro Devices Inc. (AMD).

AMD shares fell 1 1/8 to 17 1/16 after it issued another profit warning. Micron Technology closed off 4 9/16 to 39 3/8 after it reported losses after Wednesday's bell. Intel Corp. (INTC) closed off 1 1/2 to 55 1/16.

Mindspring Enterprises Inc. (MSPG) gained 3 1/2 to 82 1/8 on merger rumors Yahoo! Inc. (YHOO) closed off 4 5/8 to 150 7/8 while Amazon.com Inc. (AMZN) and Infoseek Corp. (SEEK) shed 4 1/8 and 1 1/16 a share, respectively. Lycos Inc. (LCOS) picked up 1 15/16 to 95 7/16 and America Online Inc. (AOL) fell 5 1/8 to 106 5/8.

Omnipoint Corp. (OMPT) soared up 8 13/64 to 29 1/64 on news that VoiceStream Wireless Corp. (VSTR) will buy it.

Among widely held PC stocks, Dell Computer Corp. (DELL) trimmed 3/16 to 38 1/8; Compaq Computer Corp. (CPQ) drifted off 13/16 to 22 5/8; Gateway Inc. (GTW) dropped 2 to 62 5/8; Apple Computer Inc. (AAPL) lost 1 3/8 to 42 5/16 and IBM Corp. (IBM) closed off 1/16 to 122 1/8.

Tektronix Inc. (TEK) closed up 3 ? to 29 13/16 after it reported fourth quarter earnings of $24.9 million, or 53 cents a share, beating First Call estimates by a penny. Tektronix will also spin off its measurement unit and color printing and imaging division.

Microsoft Corp. (MSFT) dropped 1 3/8 to 42 5/16 and Oracle Corp. (ORCL) tacked on 9/16 to 35 11/16.