Stocks accelerated declines on Monday after comments from U.S. President Barack Obama did little to soothe investors anxious over the slowing pace of the recovery.

Obama said he and his economic team discussed additional steps to promote economic growth, including looking at tax cuts for businesses. Stocks had been trading lower prior to the comments and the losses picked up steam.

On the S&P 500, financial and consumer shares led the way down, while the Nasdaq fared worse than the other two indexes as big-cap technology shares weighed.

The Dow Jones industrial average <.DJI> slipped 78.94 points, or 0.78 percent, to 10,071.71. The Standard & Poor's 500 Index <.SPX> fell 8.45 points, or 0.79 percent, to 1,056.14. The Nasdaq Composite Index <.IXIC> gave up 18.38 points, or 0.85 percent, at 2,135.25.

(Reporting by Leah Schnurr; Editing by Kenneth Barry)

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