Dow ends over 300 points lower, loses grip on gains for the year

U.S. stocks closed lower on Tuesday, with losses deepening into the closing bell and the Dow losing its grip on gains for the year. The Dow Jones Industrial Average
DJIA,
-1.01%
closed about 336 points lower, or 1%, ending near 33,012, according to preliminary FactSet figures. The S&P 500
SPX,
-0.64%
shed 0.6% and the Nasdaq Composite Index
COMP,
-0.18%
closed 0.2% lower, with all three indexes ending near the session lows. Stocks were under pressure as President Joe Biden was set to meet with four top U.S. lawmakers for talks on raising the federal government’s borrowing limit, with a goal of avoiding a market-shaking U.S. default. The White House Tuesday afternoon said Biden might cut short an overseas trip to deal with the debt-ceiling talks. For the year, the Dow was down 0.4% through Tuesday, while the S&P 500 was still up 7% and the Nasdaq was 17.9% higher, according to FactSet.