North American markets ended Tuesday mired in red ink with technology and gold stocks leading the way lower in Toronto and U.S. markets pre-occupied with a rise in crude oil prices above US$52 a barrel and talk of possible large losses at a hedge fund.

At close, the Toronto Stock Exchange S&P/TSX composite was down 67.61 points or 0.71% to 9493.59, while the junior TSX Venture Exchange slid 11.45 points or 0.67% to 1686.02.

On Wall Street, the blue-chip Dow industrials suffered a triple-digit loss, falling 103.23 or 0.99% lower at 10281.11. The Nasdaq composite fell 16.90 points or 0.85% at 1962.77, while the S&P 500 index was off 12.62 points or 1.07% at 1166.22.

Late in the session, the Canadian dollar was ahead 0.11 of a cent at US80.84¢.

On Bay Street, only one of the TSX’s 13 sub-groups was in the black as utility shares added 0.17%. Gold shares, down 2.01%, and materials shares, which fell 1.75%, led the fall. The metals and mining group lost 1.56%.

Energy stocks also fell, losing 0.60%. This was despite the fact oil prices shot to more than US$53 a barrel after news of a big refinery outage in the United States added to fears about a shortage of refined products and offset the impact of swelling crude supplies. U.S. light crude for June delivery was down 23¢ at $51.80 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange, after climbing as high as US$53.10.

Meanwhile, technology stocks were down 1.89%. The jitters may have been because of the release late Tuesday of results from U.S. bellwether Cisco Systems, the largest maker of communications equipment used to direct traffic over the Internet.

Nortel Networks Corp., one of the world’s biggest telecoms equipment makers, gave back more than half of Monday’s gains, easing 17¢ or 5.25%, to $3.07.

On Wall Street, U.S. investors were spooked over the jump in oil prices. But they also may have been reacting to rumours that a couple of hedge funds could be in difficulty because of over-exposure to General Motors Corp. debt, downgraded last week to junk status.

Shares of J.P. Morgan Chase & Co and Citigroup Inc. fell, along with those of other Wall Street firms, after Germany’s Deutsche Bank declined 3% following market talk of investment banking losses, possibly in connection with a hedge fund.

J.P. Morgan Chase lost 2.28% to US$35.14 and was the biggest percentage decliner in the blue-chip Dow average, while Citigroup, another Dow component, was down 1% at US$46.38.