Stocks opened in the red on Tuesday after snapping a two-day streak of gains on Monday.
Near 10:45 a.m. ET on Tuesday, the Dow was down 51 points, the S&P 500 was down 8 points, and the Nasdaq was down 28 points.
US Treasuries continued their recent sell off, with the yield on the benchmark 10-year note gaining one basis point, or 0.01, to 2.28%. The yield on the long 30-year bond was at 3.05%, the highest since early November.
European stocks also tumbled on Tuesday, with every major index on the continent falling more than 1%.
The big company news today is Verizon's acquisition of AOL for $4.4 billion, or $50 per share. That's a 17% premium over AOL's Monday closing price of $42.59.
In early trading, AOL shares rose 17% to around $50.13 per share, after surging in pre-market trading. Verizon shares fell around 1%.
In economic data, the NFIB small business optimism report rose to 96.9, beating the forecast for a reading of 96, and up from 95.2 in the prior month, according to Bloomberg.
And, the number of job openings fell to 4.99 million in March from 5.144 in February. Expectations were for a slight drop to 5.108 million.
Hirings rose, to 5.07 million offers from 5.01 in February.
