RIM Drags Stocks Lower

A 17 percent plunge in shares of Research in Motion (NASDAQ: RIMM) sent stocks to their third straight loss on Friday.

RIM tumbled $14.15 to $68.91, a two-month low, in heavy trading after the BlackBerry maker missed sales estimates and offered a disappointing revenue outlook.

The news didn’t seem to hurt smartphone rivals Apple (NASDAQ: AAPL) and Palm (NASDAQ: PALM) all that much, as investors speculated that they may be gaining share at RIM’s expense. Apple ended the day down by 0.8 percent, while Palm added more than 1 percent despite rumors that Verizon (NYSE: VZ) might not sell the Palm Pre.

Dell (NASDAQ: DELL) lost 2.7 percent, but IBM (NYSE: IBM) and HP (NYSE: HPQ) ended the day slightly higher despite a tepid outlook from HP.

EMC (NYSE: EMC), VMware (NYSE: VMW), Google (NASDAQ: GOOG) and Amazon (NASDAQ: AMZN) were weak, but AMD (NYSE: AMD), Yahoo (NASDAQ: YHOO) and Applied Materials (NASDAQ: AMAT) managed to post gains.

Shanda Games (NASDAQ: GAME) had a poorly received IPO, which weighed on shares of parent Shanda Interactive (NASDAQ: SNDA).

Weaker than expected durable orders and new home sales weighed on the broader market, as the major indexes lost around 2 percent for the week.

The Nasdaq lost 16 to 2090, the S&P 500 fell 6 to 1044, and the Dow lost 42 to 9665. Volume declined to 4.51 billion shares on the NYSE, and 2.38 billion on the Nasdaq. Decliners led by a 20-16 margin on the NYSE, and 15-10 on the Nasdaq. Downside volume was 67 percent on the NYSE, and 64 percent on the Nasdaq. New highs-new lows were 170-31 on the NYSE, and 38-11 on the Nasdaq.