Markets are suffering a broad selloff today, as some of the early excitement has fallen victim to economic uncertainty and negative corporate news.

The S&P/TSX index is down 72 points at midday to 5,955. Apart from sliding under the 6,000 mark, market internals are simply horrible. Volume is strong at 87 million shares, but the selling volume is overwhelming the buying by almost four to one and market breadth is deeply bearish, with losers outnumbering winners by about five to two.

Every sector is down at midday, except the golds, which are seeing some modest buying activity. But elsewhere, weak earnings and earnings warnings in several companies are dimming the profit outlook. Traders have dropped the early, optimistic interpretation of U.S. jobs numbers in favour of the skeptics. Economic uncertainty is now weighing on stocks too. Techs are down almost 3%, there is also convincing weakness in consumer stocks, financials and diversifieds.

The financials are generally leading the way down today, with Manulife Financial off almost 4% in heavy trading. CIBC is down 4.4%, and Royal Bank is weaker too. TD Bank is picking up some of this action, recording a small gain in active trading.

Worries about profits and economics are assailing stocks generally, hitting names such as Alcan, BCE, Quebecor and EnCana.

Profit worries are particularly strong for techs, led down by a 10% drop in Celestica. There is also notable selling in Ballard Power, CGI Group, CAE, Shaw Communications and Cogeco Cable. But, Research in Motion is stronger today, as is Zarlink and Cognos.

The golds are up a bit even with market leader Barrick running flat. Goldcorp is leading the group higher.

There is some isolated buying in names such as Co-Steel, Finning,
Sobeys, Torstar, Aber Diamond and Ketch Energy.

In New York, markets wereinitially reading the jobs numbers as positive and opened higher. However, the conviction in this call waned on reflection and profit worries crept in after aluminum giant Alcoa reported a big profit slide. At midday, the Dow Jones industrial average is down 117 points at 7,600. The S&P 500 has lost 11 points to 808. And, Nasdaq is down 15 points to 1,150.

The small caps are not immune to the rash of sell activity either. The S&P/TSX Venture index is down four ticks to 942. Volume remains weak at just 9.3 million shares. Epicentrix is the day’s top trader and is flat at 4¢ per share on 500,000 shares traded.