NEW YORK. May 4: Wall Street stocks were hammered nearly across the board yesterday as Inflation worries sparked a selloff ahead of a speech by Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan, says Reuters.

Cash flew to the sidelines as economic numbers, comments from a central banker and the Fed's Beige Book summary of the economy ratcheted up fears of a big increase in interest rates when policymakers meet on May 16.

"With no real players out there and no real demand and

some skittish money coming out of the marketplace, this is the reaction you get." said Arthur Hogan, chief market analyst at Jeferies & Co.

The Dow Jones industrial average ended down 250.99 points, or 2.34 per cent, at 10.480.13. The New York Stock Exchange turned on its programme trading curbs when the index slid past the 200-point mark.

Only five of the Dow's 30 stocks managed to climb as investors beat back the retail, energy. financial, technology and consumer products sectors.

The Nasdaq composite index lost 78.14 points, or 2.06 per cent, to 3.707.31. rebounding in the final minutes of trading from a drop of 4.75 per cent. Leading technology companies fell on a profit warning from software maker Novell Inc.

Nasdaq has logged two sessions in a row of losses, having slid 172 points on Tuesday.

Measures of the wider market also suffered with the Standard & Poor’s 500 index down 31.19 points, or 2.16 per cent, to 1.415.10. and the Wilshire 5000 down 278.66 points, or 2.07 per cent, to 13,179.24

"The market is looking for direction." said Peter Coolidge, senior equity trader at Brean Murray & Co. "It is hard for people to get a lot of enthusiasm for the market when they don't know what the Federal Reserve might do."

The central bank's policy-setting committee meets May 16 to decide whether to jack up interest rates for what would be the sixth time since last June.

A growing number of analysts are forecasting the central bank will opt for an aggressive 50-basis-point boost to slow the economy.